How did I kill so many shrimp so fast?

[Linwood]

I'm baffled. There is a bit of a story, but the short version is I had about 40-50 wild caught ghost shrimp, put them in a quarantine tank, and about 4 hours later 80% of them are dead.

Slightly longer story -- same tank, a few weeks ago, I had red cherry shrimp in it destined for our big tank, and added a pregnant ghost shrimp (from another tank she had been in for months) to it, and she was dead the next morning. The RCS looked stunned. I never completely figured it out -- I THINK it may have been too much guppy grass (came with the RCS) in it, no light, and not enough aeration. I had also added some Seachem ferts (for the grass). Added an air pump, no more ferts, 50% water change, the RCS lived, I didn't try more ghost shrimp.

So... fast forward, QT was emptied of all plants, 70% water change +/-, thorough vacuum (no substrate), a few snails remained, I shot a bit of ammonia in there once a week to keep the BB alive, verified it went to nitrates.

So today I go out and catch a bunch of shrimp and some plants. Here's the whole story in case you see a mistake:

I dipped the plants in a mild (about 20:1 clorox) chlorine solution for a couple minutes, then washed in two successive baths of Prime treated water (one heavy, about 5x normal, one about twice). After picking out the plants I wanted, and they sat about 30 minutes in the last bath, put them into the waiting tank.

Then netted the ghost shrimp from the bucket (they were in the same bucket as the plants, and 5 accidental minnows). They went into a separate tank of freshly mixed water (same chemistry), then when I got them all in, I netted them again to the QT. No (significant) amount of original water went.

I moved the 5 minnows with the ghost shrimp, just because I was curious to see what they were. Tiny, no danger to them.

Into the QT now I added a few flakes of food, everyone looked happy, very active, many grabbed flakes and started eating, some just swam wildly. All looked normal.

Water: I had matched the tank to the approximate pond temp (84) ahead of time. When I got home I checked the pond water chemistry, and found it very near my tank (right at the same PH by accident, a bit harder (10 dGH vs 6 in the tank), about the same dKH (5 vs. 6). So I did not do anything specific to acclimate the shrimp (or more precisely I had done so by making them similar). The shrimp had probably cooled off 3-4 degrees though in transit while netting. Maybe.

The tank is a 10G, with a small HOB that is cycled. This time I did not add any fertilizers. After they died (and it was literally just 3-4 hours, and 80% death rate), I rechecked the chemistry - nothing I can see.

The shrimp looked perfect, just dead. No sign of parasites, injury. Some big, some small died (I would say the very largest did not though).

The tank has never had any medicines in it. It has had about 10 fish go through it, all that ended up healthy and were moved to my main tank and are in good shape. It's bare glass, no decorations, Seachem matrix in the filter. Water is clear.

All the water is RODI water mixed with Equilibrium, acid and alkaline buffer to a slightly alkaline mixture (I aim at 7 but it always ends up around 7.4-7.6). I don't store the water, I make it the day before I need it, and mix it in the same buckets as my other tanks which are fine.

Oh.. the minnows are doing just fine (I have no idea what to feed them so they are certainly not going to survive, but as a health indicator, they didn't die).

What in the world could I be doing that is so deadly in that tank to ghost shrimp?

Oh... I have ghost shrimp (from a LFS back in may) in my 45G. They are healthy, happy, getting big. So there's nothing just endemic in the water I use, or my personality.

80% mortality!

Any ideas? What would you check?

PS. After this I'll probably bleach all parts of the tank and reconstitute and re-cycle it, just to be sure.

 

[treemanone2003]

Did you acclimate them to the water by drip method or just dump them in ? That would be my only thought at this point. They aren't too hardy and the slightest shock is definitely too much for them to handle.


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[Fresh2o]

The pond that the shrimp are coming from...is this landlocked or connected via canals to nearby marshes or estuaries? Are there differences in the specific gravity between the pond and aquarium?


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[Linwood]

Did you acclimate them to the water by drip method or just dump them in ? That would be my only thought at this point. They aren't too hardy and the slightest shock is definitely too much for them to handle. .

No, though as mentioned I tested to see that I had fairly compatible hardness and ph. I probably could have done something in that regard, but they were in a bucket that was opaque with algae and plants, and I was pouring it off slowly and pulling out plants trying to actually find them, so as I did they went into new water.

That may be related, but unless it was some other factor than hardness or PH it was not that much of a shock. And I did match up temps.

The pond that the shrimp are coming from...is this landlocked or connected via canals to nearby marshes or estuaries? Are there differences in the specific gravity between the pond and aquarium?

I am pretty sure not, at least from salt from the nearby gulf. The area is here:

https://www.google.com/maps/@26.6485967,-81.6872435,430m/data=!3m1!1e3

It's a flood control holding area, if you look just south of the center there's one of the staggered dams for controlling outflow. It's a goodly way from the Caloosahatchee River, and quite a bit higher.

Now as a holding pond it gets a lot of runoff and massive evaporation in the winter so maybe there is other chemistry at work. I was surprised to find a relatively mild ph as opposed to quite alkaline (since all of this area is one big limestone rock). And it was harder (10 vs 6 dGH) than I used. I assumed the carbonate hardness was more relevant, but maybe something else was bad.

Incidentally about half the remaining died overnight. The ones not dead look quite healthy, whatever is killing them does not appear to be a slow death, there are none in there who look larthargic, either active or dead.

The minnows in there are still healthy looking.


Question: Could the chlorine-dipped plans be reacting in some fashion now and causing it? I do not think it is chlorine per se -- I did a double rinse in prime after the dip. But they had a LOT of algae, that is now dying. I just did another ammonia test in case the death was overwhelming the BB, but it came back zero. But some other poison byproduct of killed algae?

The only other thing I can think of is that I did not actually empty and wash the tank, I vacuumed out the old food (etc), so there are surely some remains in there from a couple weeks ago with fish. But there's no substrate or decorations, so it was pretty clean.

And this time I did run an airstone over night to make sure there was enough oxygen (last time I wondered if the heavy plant presence pulled down the o2 level at night with just the mild flow from the HOB).

Maybe I shocked them. But it bothers me that twice now I've put ghost shrimp in that tank and had them die. And the first time it was a ghost shrimp that lived in that (equivalent) water in another tank for months. Maybe it was just her time, but it was a big coincidence.

It's an old, bought-used "All Glass" aquarium, which I initially cleaned and sterilized with bleach. There are no repairs visible (i.e. no reason to suspect weird glues). The HOB is an Aqueon 10, also cleaned with bleach when I bought it (at the same time as the tank). I do not run their filters, just the blue mesh with a pile of Matrix behind it, which was donated by another of my tanks, and has cycled (and one mini cycle when I cleaned it a bit too much after an algae mess 2 months ago).

I'm just at a loss for what makes it so deadly to Ghost shrimp. Sorry for the long post, just trying to give all the surrounding info in case it rings a bell with someone.

 

[Linwood]

Well, there is a bit more to the story. There were a bunch of MTS that were in the bucket. I carefully picked through to make sure they were alive (saw them moving in the original bucket first).

They are almost all dead now also. the body in several is half out of the shell, still, and facing up.

It would appear there's something lethal to invertebrates in that water, I have no idea what.

Time to completely deconstruct that tank, I guess.

 

[54seaweed]

inverts both fresh and salt are very sensitive to any sudden change in water parameters
the slightest difference in water quality will and can kill them instantly,

another thought you said you soaked plants in clorox
plants will exorb that , when you introduced them back in your bucket even though you rinsed them , they could still leach out clorox when put into clean water
this also could have killed the shrimp

 

[Linwood]

inverts both fresh and salt are very sensitive to any sudden change in water parameters
the slightest difference in water quality will and can kill them instantly,

another thought you said you soaked plants in clorox
plants will exorb that , when you introduced them back in your bucket even though you rinsed them , they could still leach out clorox when put into clean water
this also could have killed the shrimp

The latter is certainly a possibility. I guess I should have kept the plants separate, but it was convenient.

I do now see a couple MTS that are alive, probably about half died also.

I put the remaining shrimp into my regular tank. They are transparent and no significant sized parasites visible, and they will either quickly become food, or at least have known-clean water (as there are other ghost shrimp in there).

I'm just going to tear that tank down and redo it now (well, going to wait a few days and see what the plants do).

 

[54seaweed]

The latter is certainly a possibility. I guess I should have kept the plants separate, but it was convenient.

I do now see a couple MTS that are alive, probably about half died also.

I put the remaining shrimp into my regular tank. They are transparent and no significant sized parasites visible, and they will either quickly become food, or at least have known-clean water (as there are other ghost shrimp in there).

I'm just going to tear that tank down and redo it now (well, going to wait a few days and see what the plants do).

i would say use a clean 5g bucket with clean tank water and some kind of circulation pump put all the plants in that for about a week , so if they are leaching bleach
it will dilute to a safe level and not harm anything in display when introduced

 

[Fresh2o]

i would say use a clean 5g bucket with clean tank water and some kind of circulation pump put all the plants in that for about a week , so if they are leaching bleach
it will dilute to a safe level and not harm anything in display when introduced

Along that line, hold off on the plants altogether and try again. With a clean well rinsed tank.


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[Linwood]

Along that line, hold off on the plants altogether and try again. With a clean well rinsed tank.

Yeah, I'm kind of leaning that way.

I think the risk from snails is low, I took two of the largest, alive MTS and already moved them to the new tank. I have been of mixed minds about needing them there (it's planted with pretty deep sand). Not sure if they'll survive, but they were big and dark colored and probably good genes from the wild compared to some from stores.

But not knowing what caused all this makes me worried, especially with something as much surface area s the plants.

Is it possible the tank was previously used for a hospital tank, and had some kind of medicine in it that survived a cosmetic cleaning + bleach rinse when I set it up? I would think anything like that would be so incredibly dilute as to be harmless. But still grasping at a real cause.

I get that it may be shock, but it just doesn't seem likely. I've brought ghost shrimp home from LFS's and shocked them far more, and from shrimp probably much more mistreated, and most lived. I'm not sure delicate is a fair description. They've turned into monster shrimp that probably frighten the fish.

It could be shock. But I'm 3 for 3 with shrimp living introduced directly into other tanks (no acclimation), and 0 for 2 in this tank. It just feels like there's more to the story.

And MTS are supposed to be invulnerable, go through sewers, etc... And a bunch of them died on hitting this tank.

 

[Fishfur]

If I had to venture a guess, my guess would be the deaths were caused by the change from their pond water to treated water, and possibly a big difference in TDS. You can get a TDS meter fairly cheaply and check.

The usual way to acclimate shrimp involves very gradually adding the new water to their existing water. Either a tube is used, [ called dripping], to drip new water in very slowly over several hours or overnight, or some will simply add a half cup of the new water to the existing water, every 15 - 30 minutes, until at least half the water is new water. Normally this is done with a bag of shrimp from the store, involving quite small volumes of water.

If you had a bucket full, you could have done the same, just using more water. I don't think it would have been chlorine from the plants, simply because you used so much Prime, but if they were not thoroughly rinsed after the last Prime bath, too much Prime might have caused the deaths too. I would have soaked the plants in a bucket of clean tap water before adding them to a tank, and shaken off as much water as I could just before putting them into the tank.

If you try catching wild shrimp again, try the drip acclimating process. I think it will make a big difference. Many shrimp keepers believe the reason shrimp die when they're put in a new tank is due to differences in TDS, much more so than any differences in pH, GH or KH, or temperature. Ghost shrimp are, by and large, quite hardy creatures, but they're not immune to shock if the change was big enough. If you get a TDS meter, check the TDS of your tap water and the TDS of the water any new shrimp are in, then try to match it up as closely as you can. Distilled or RO water is zero TDS, so can be used to adjust TDS levels.

 

[Linwood]

If I had to venture a guess, my guess would be the deaths were caused by the change from their pond water to treated water, and possibly a big difference in TDS. You can get a TDS meter fairly cheaply and check.
...
If you try catching wild shrimp again, try the drip acclimating process.

It's possible. I did measure dKH and dGH, and they were somewhat close (dKH almost matched and dGH was lower in my water, 6 vs. 10). I have a TDS meter but I did not measure it for the pond.

Should it relate closely to dKH and dGH, or do other ionic solids not play into one of those?

But yes, I'll try next time with acclimation.

All that said...

too much Prime might have caused the deaths too. I would have soaked the plants in a bucket of clean tap water before adding them to a tank, and shaken off as much water as I could just before putting them into the tank.

Now that's an interesting thought. I did not know Prime could easily be over-dosed. I do not use it normally since I use RODI. I admit to being very casual how much I put into the plant-washing tanks, with the goal of making sure I had plenty. But they were lifted straight from the lower-dosed-Prime tank and dropped into the QT, so absolutely some went with it. But it is hard to believe even then just the water on the plants would carry much along with it.

And... back to the first time this occurred (with admittedly only one shrimp, and perhaps a different cause) no Prime was involved.

Regardless, even if I do not really think that was the cause, I'll drip acclimate them next time. I'll also do more separation of my plant collecting from my shrimp collecting, I used the same bucket so as not to haul two around. That made it a lot harder to find the shrimp, to which adding acclimation just did not occur.

 

[Fishfur]

TDS is not that closely related to GH and KH. It actually measures the Total Dissolved Solids in the water and the minerals measured by GH and KH are only a few of the many things that may be dissolved in the water. There could have been quite a big difference between their pond and your tap. Only way to know is to check.

Prime isn't all that easy to overdose, but given the amounts you used, and that you didn't do a final rinse in clean water, it's possible there was too much of it for some period of time. Prime doesn't last more than 24 hours, but if there was more than was needed to neutralize chlorine/chloramines, then it wouldn't have been used up right away by the neutralizing process and that is why I thought it might, possibly, have been the problem or maybe part of the problem.

Where shrimp and other inverts are concerned, I try to err on the side of being a bit obsessive when it comes to not exposing them to any kind of chemical, even those we think of as being fairly benign, like Prime. Better safe than sorry, in other words.

 

[Linwood]

TDS is not that closely related to GH and KH. It actually measures the Total Dissolved Solids in the water and the minerals measured by GH and KH are only a few of the many things that may be dissolved in the water. There could have been quite a big difference between their pond and your tap. Only way to know is to check.

It's a bit of a drive but next time I'm out there I'll check that pond. And wherever I go next will also check the TDS.

But let's say it was radically different. My RODI-remineralied water is something like 350, suppose the pond was 800.

Other than acclimate, is there any other thing to be done?

 

[Fishfur]

Probably won't be that big a difference. Tap water is usually regulated, I think there is a national standard, though I am not certain of that. Most tap is around 180 or so [ that is, a TDS meter would read 180, I'm not sure if it means PPM or something else], give or take. Some places will be higher, some lower, depending on the source water and the local water company policies for treatment and whatever regulations apply.

But if it was a truly huge difference, I think the only thing would be to do an extended acclimation. Shrimp and fish can be remarkably adaptable if the changes occur over a length of time.

Even some aquariums can end up with quite high TDS, especially if you top up with tap or remineralized RO. I imagine you know that already, but some folks don't. Changes should be done with the remineralized, but tops up should be done with RO or DI, because that way you aren't always adding more solids to the mix. Bigger problem for salt water tanks.. if they are topped up with salt water, they eventually become so saline nothing can survive in them. Same principle with FW.

Some natural waters can have pretty high TDS, it depends, again, where the water comes from, where the body of water is located and perhaps the makeup of the substrate of the body of water. Some rocks leach a lot more minerals into water than others. Some locations are more polluted than others. If there is any industry around, or upstream, that might be discharging any effluent into water, that could make a huge difference to TDS.

Just some speculation on my part, since I don't know where this pond is or what the local conditions are like.

 

[Linwood]

Probably won't be that big a difference. Tap water is usually regulated, I think there is a national standard, though I am not certain of that. Most tap is around 180 or so

Yeah, we are around 350-400 on a good day. 1960's iron pipes, and frequently a burst of brown comes through. The city's answer is "run your water for a while". Some days it smells awful, like a swamp, other days it is fine. PH out of the tap is between 8.4 an 8.8 -- maybe higher, not sure I can read higher.

At least they only use regular chlorine.

It's why I switched to RODI. With two carbon filters in front.

Shrimp and fish can be remarkably adaptable if the changes occur over a length of time.

What's surprising to me is the MTS. We have a parallel irrigation water from the city that's reclaimed (I think it may be the waste from the RO system they use). They lost control of it and it's infested now with MTS -- we get hundreds of them in our irrigation filter (and if no filter, your system quickly clogs). I ran a bucket one day and got several live MTS out of it. Those are some tough snails.

And bunches of them (well, their brothers) died in my QT.

Even some aquariums can end up with quite high TDS, especially if you top up with tap or remineralized RO. I imagine you know that already, but some folks don't.

Yes, of course, and I monitor both TDS and Nitrates as I'm going for "long time between water changes" with a very high plant to fish ratio. Trying for that balance is why I appreciate any insight into water chemistry I can get, so thanks.

Just some speculation on my part, since I don't know where this pond is or what the local conditions are like.

I appreciate the discussion, thank you.

Not that it answers the open questions, if you are curious, it's here (+/- a few hundred hards of where 38th street hits that dirt road):

Harns Marsh

 

[Cold Canadian]

Do you have any copper I hear that copper is very toxic to invertebrates but not fish so that might explain alot.


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[Linwood]

Do you have any copper I hear that copper is very toxic to invertebrates but not fish so that might explain alot.

No, and I think nothing that could have escaped my initial cleaning (it was used) could have enough to matter.

It's interesting. Some of the "dead" MTS have come back to life. Maybe they were just very effective fakes, or maybe they were stunned in some fashion.

I realize they often retract on seeing people -- but these were hanging out of the shell, upside down, and not retracting and not moving. Now some (not all) are moving.

 

[AliGee]

I NEVER soak my plants in chlorine... It can soak into the roots and you never know if it's actually all out. It's a quick killer for inverts.


Invertebrates
Electric Blue Crayfish | CPO Crayfish | Shrimp

 

[Fishfur]

I've found MTS snails to be serious survivors. Some I've been certain were dead have revived overnight, surprising me the next day.

They are certainly not bothered by the chlorine in tap water, so far as I can tell, and survive water conditions that kill many other creatures, including other snails. I have a couple of species, though I don't know which ones they are specifically. One is substantially larger than the other.

I think it is probably too cold for MTS to survive in our local waters over winter, but the lake has zebra mussels instead, which clog up pipes, cover underwater structures of all kinds, intakes and outputs everywhere. A big problem for the power turbines, among other things. Came in ship's ballast, now a major problem throughout the lake system.

That TDS on your tap water is very high, so it's just as well you're doing RO. Old pipes are a pain sometimes for sure. The building I live in always has problems. Though most of the piping was replaced with copper, this place was built in the 60's, and every time there is any repair done on the plumbing, we get dirty brown yuck water for the first while afterward. We also get quite a swamp smell at times, but so far, only in summers when our source, Lake Ontario, has a big algae bloom. We are told the smell is not dangerous, but it sure doesn't make you want to drink the stuff, never mind make tea or coffee out of it.