dead inverts!!

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jwalsh

Aquarium Advice Freak
Joined
Sep 8, 2011
Messages
429
Location
Wisconsin
So my tank has been running for 4 months now and all levels are great! So in the last 2 weeks I have added a cleaner shrimp and a michaels pistol shrimp. Both have died within 36 hours. But I added a watchman goby with the cleaner and a sailfin tang with the michaels. And both fish are doing great! So what is the problem? The only thing I can think is my large emerald crab is killing and eating them but then again my michaels pistol shrimp was about 1 1/2 inches long so it should have held its own but idk. If anyone has any ideas please let me know. Thanks
 
How big is your emerald crab? Have you been keeping up with your PWCs? I know shrimp have been known to die during their molting process if there is not enough iodine in the water.
 
He is about 1 1/2" and it couldn't be during molting because everything else is molting just fine all the hermits and everything I do my pwc every 2 weeks and check levels every week. If too high ill my pwc early but never had an issue
 
Its about 1 1/2" and I do pwc every 2 weeks and check levels every week haven't had a problem since the end of the 1st month. Idk what the problem could be.
 
How about acclimation process? Sometimes inverts can have a tough time during acclimation. Fish can adjust little better
 
I hang the bag on the inside of the tank and put in a shot glass worth of tank water in the bag every 5 min for an hour. If this is wrong please tell me how to do it correctly so I don't waste any more money
 
That method is fine although you can increase water amount you add over the course of the time and be up to a bigger cup toward the end. It isn't as important and how long you do it. More important is the parameters match. Inverts and sensitive to salinity and ph. You can always test salinity before you add to tank. If my math is correct that works out to be 12 ounces of water added to bag. Which doesn't seem like much. Do you at least double the water volume in bag?? You can also do drip acclimation which is over course of hour or so as well and slowly drips water into another canister or tank and starts off with slow drip and you gradually speed it up every 10 min or so.
 
Yeah I double the water by the time I'm done. Ill have to look into the drip system. Can you get that at the lfs?
 
jwalsh said:
Yeah I double the water by the time I'm done. Ill have to look into the drip system. Can you get that at the lfs?

You probably have what you need at your house. Can use old salt bucket maybe. Cleaned well of course. Use a long piece of 1/4 airline start a siphon and tie it in a knot and let it sit in bucket with new addition. Start drip at about 2 or 3 drips every few seconds and loosen knot every 10 min. By time hour is up should at least double water volume. The water stream can but almost steady drip. Even if more than double volume. No harm done. If parameters match that is what is important. For me it is mainly salt. Ph and temp should be good with the water going in.
 
So I should just test the water in my bucket to make sure its the same as in my tank before introducing livestock into tank?
 
So I should just test the water in my bucket to make sure its the same as in my tank before introducing livestock into tank?

You can, but i never do. For fish i drip for about 1.5 hours. Inverts go in after half an hour or so if that.
 
I would and I do. I only test the salinity. I assume all other parameters are good and matching after the hour or so of acclimation. If your local store keeps salinity at 1.022 and your tank is at 1.025 it may not be up thy high after 1 hour.
 
After drip acclimation, there should be very little of the original lfs water remaining. I remove half the total water about every half hour. This gradually removes the original lfs water as you drip etc.
 
AquaRick said:
After drip acclimation, there should be very little of the original lfs water remaining. I remove half the total water about every half hour. This gradually removes the original lfs water as you drip etc.

Oh good idea. I'm still learning new techniques after 7 years. During my drips I'll even dump cup full in every once in while. After hour my salinity rarely doesn't match. My LFS keeps salt at 1.022 my salt at 1.024.
 
I buy my stuff from a guy that runs a fish store out of his basement and he must run his salinity low because I know at the lfs I never had a problem and they run theirs at 1.025 and I run mine at 1.026 so that didn't take much but maybe this guy is different and that's causing the problems. But the shrimp I got never came out of the shipping bag. So idk. If this keeps happening ill go back to the lfs the price might be double but ill only have to pay for it once and I hate seeing those little guys die
 
Out of his basement? Um...would you buy a "rolex" off the street? You are setting yourself up for failure there man. I won't even start listing the reasons why your stuff will die.
 
No I mean the guy is legit its a full on store he's legal pays sales tax and everything. He used to own a store then he closed it down because his wife had health problems and decided to start it up in his basement now since his wife is starting to get better
 
Isn't 1.022 is a bit low to be running his inverts? But i guess if the owner is slowly acclimating it to them over time it's not too big a deal.
 
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