# Amano shrimp HELP



## aquascape1987 (1 May 2016)

Hi. I'm looking for a bit of advice on a shrimp problem that I'm having. In that I appear to be poisoning them.

I've had a heavily planted scape running since December, using EI ferts and CO2,  which became overrun with brown algae. On Wednesday and Thursday this week I ripped out and replaced my hc carpet with new, and reprepared and then replanted a lot of the other plants I had as well. Refilled the aquarium and i added a double dose of both my macro and micro ferts as well as  5ml of liquid carbon. My drop checker is lime green. The intention behind the initial high fert and carbon dose was to hopefully help get  things moving with the plants rooting since the tank was completely emptied for the replant and therefore I didn't want to wait for the nutrients in the water to build up. I ordered 10 amano shrimp which arrived and went into the tank on Friday as well as the correct fert and liquid carbine dose for that day.

Initially  the shrimp seemed fine but after a couple of hours 1 or two seemed to be dying. (Becoming  inactive and then progressively becoming listless and just lying on the bottom twitching their legs)

The next day I came home and most were dead leaving 2 or 3 appearing to be still active (although going slightly pink).

I fished out the dead and did a 75% water change, but over the next couple of hours the remaining few seemed to have all died.

After a bit of reading, I concluded that I had made a massive school boy error with   the initial liquid carbon overdose I had in the water when I added the shrimp,so I reconciled myself to giving the tank another week without shrimp, and adding some more after my next weekly 75% water change and then cutting the liquid carbon to strictly no more than the 1ml per 50litres. Previously I had been double dosing with no ill effect to my betta,the only fish in my aquaroum currently.

Today I arrived home and realised I had 1 survivor,which I was pleased about. It seemed active and walking round fine working at the Algae etc. I added my usual micro fert dose and within 30 mins,my surviving shrimp appeared to also have gone from healthy to dying,which made me reconsider my original diagnosis of the carbon overdose,in light of the fact that to my joy,I had one seemingly healthy survivor,which basically withered and died within the 30 minutes after I had discovered it,and had been watching it. The only thing I changed since discovery was that I added my micro trace mix,which is made from the apf ei starter kit, although it is 1.5 more concentrated than the recommendations.

Could my micro trace mix be poisoning the shrimp? I have read that the level of copper in ei micro mixes, is less than 10 % the  potency approx,than that which would cause problems with shrimp.

Please help. I need to add my clean up crew to get the tank in order but I really don't want to kill anymore of the staff!!

Richard


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## aquascape1987 (1 May 2016)

And something else bizarre to add as well. The lone survivor that I found healthy, which went into spasm after adding my micro mix..... has seemingly over the last 30 minutes started to recover. This shrimp was on its back with legs slightly twitching for  the 2 hours after I added the micro. Over the last half hour I noticed that although it was still on its back,the leg movements were becoming stronger and more coordinated. It now has righted it's self and is walking around fine.... absolutely confuzzled????

It's definitely the same shrimp, as I have been observing it since it took Ill after the trace mix was added.

Perhaps a temporary reaction to the addition of my micro  fert? Just all seems so bizarre though....


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## aaron.c (1 May 2016)

I double dose afp micro mix to no ill effect. Is there any chance there could be another chemical getting in? Do you have pets that you use flea products on? They are deadly in tiny amounts


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## aquascape1987 (1 May 2016)

No. I have a dog but it lives at my gfs place. The thing is that although I thought I'd killed all 10 shrimp,and had put it down to the liquid carbon, I must have miscounted because the lone survivor I found today just trotted out from the foliage and seemed completely healthy. Right until I added the micro mix and then what I described above happened. I've just left to stay at the gfs,and by the time I had left,it had not only turned its self the right way up and started walking again,but was fully back to normal grazing on algae and moving around the tank. When I added the micro it started darting and swimming erratically allover the tank and then settled on its back, all its legs curled in and was just twitching it's legs.... like that for a few hours and then it's situation fully resolved. I'm absolutely confused


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## aquascape1987 (1 May 2016)

No liquid carbon added since I changed 75% of the water yesterday


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## xim (2 May 2016)

If your mix is 1.5x more concentrated and you dosed 2x then you overdosed it 3x.
But that should not be a problem within 24 hrs time frame. Because it should be
still less than the "regular" accumulated amount of a whole week of dosing.

Liquid carbon could be it but you said you have stopped adding it but the problem
still persists after 75% water change.

Looking at the micro mix, it is not homogeneous. I think a possibility is your particular bag
or the area you scooped the micro from has a high concentration of copper granules.
There has been speculations about the separation of the particles in CSM+B
(also an inhomogeneous mixture) overtime on other forums.


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## aaron.c (2 May 2016)

Good point xim. I always shake my trace mix before taking a scoop 


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## roadmaster (2 May 2016)

Might try different trace mix such as Flourish comprehensive and see if this makes a difference ?


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## Fran (2 May 2016)

Hi, sorry to hear about the shrimp loss. Are you de-chlorinating your water? You don't mention it. Also, you don't need to double dose if you are using EI. Just start off as normal. New plants will take time to acclimatise anyway so there is no point in adding extra ferts. Also you might consider if disturbing the substrate has released built up ammonia or anaerobic bacteria into the water. I am no expert but have read that disturbing your substrate, particularly sand can release harmful substances. Hope you get to the bottom of it.


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## Aqua360 (2 May 2016)

Sounds similar to what I experienced with copper...I stopped adding the trace mix and haven't had problems since. Obviously some is necessary for the plants, but I'd scrutinise it heavily


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## aquascape1987 (2 May 2016)

Thanks for the replys guys.  I think I'm gonna pour away my trace mix, thoroughly shake the powder in the bag and mix some more up before trying again. Failing that I'll get some more powder ordered.

I don't declorinate the water,and I haven't done for a long time,after a horrible experience of adding a well known one at the correct dose during a water change, and the next day all of my fish floating on top of the tank dead. Since then I haven't bothered and haven't had any problems with aquarium plants or inhabitants,until this.

I get that double dosing a 1.5 x concentrated mixture is dosing 3x, but that was the idea, to get the content of nutrients in the new water higher,at an earlier stage, than letting it build up over days. I get really annoyed with clumps of hc floating up in the early stages of planting,especially after spending 2 full days planting it, and was hoping to accelerate the rooting process somewhat by flooding the water column with nutrients,  and having the first two photo periods much longer than standard.From everything that I know about EI, the trace amounts of copper in the this shouldn't be anywhere near enough to harm shrimp. But the idea of scooping up a bit of the powder more highly concentrated in copper than it should be does seem plausible though, and one thing that sticks in my mind from mixing the new batch last week, is seeing the bits  of powder that I spilled on the worktop,  contained a lot of large green bits. In which case the concentration in the mix ,coupled with my 3 x dosing could have been anything but safe. I'll stabilise the tank this week with the new trace mix and then another big water change, before adding some more shrimp next week.


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## aquascape1987 (2 May 2016)

Double post by mistake


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## MrHidley (2 May 2016)

I lost all my Amanos in my first 60p set up, the second set up I didn't use liquid carbon and no shrimp loss. Entirely anecdotal, but gave me reason enough to consider dosage levels of Glut in the future.


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## greenmac75 (3 May 2016)

there's no need to double dose EI covers all needs, just dose as instructions and remember your min 50% weekly water change to reset nutrient levels.

+1 for copper


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## aquascape1987 (3 May 2016)

I must admit that I strongly suspect the glut but it was just the shrimps reaction  when I added the micro mix that threw me. The sole survivor is still going strong now, so I'm going to keep an eye on him this week,before adding some more next week


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## aquascape1987 (3 May 2016)

Hi, I'm fully versed in the concept behind ei, and I don't double dose as standard. This was to quickly bring the levels in the completely new tank water up to a reasonable level, earlier than waiting for 3 or 4 days dosing. I wanted the plants to have everything they needed to encourage quicker rooting and anchoring. I've replaced my trace mix now as well and stopped doing the liquid carbon, so am hoping that this solves the problem. So far it looks good with the shrimp I have left


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## roundasapound (16 May 2016)

Hi, that's strange as I dose 1ml daily of liquid carbon in the tank + CO2 injection.  The 6 Amanos and 4 Bamboo Shrimp remain unaffected.


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## Easternlethal (16 May 2016)

Its always hard to diagnose problems with new inhabitants. I once had a whole school of new otos die on me even though the existing ones in the tank were fine.


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## andyone (9 Jul 2016)

Just had the exact same issue in my tank increased the liquid carbon (dbl dose) to help deal with BBA lost 50% of my shrimp. Hoping that a 75% water change saves the rest which are lethargic to the point the fish are picking them off.


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## SinkorSwim (14 Jul 2016)

I use tropica green and orange ferts  - no effects, i attempted 1/2 dosage of liquid carbo and saw a big difference in activity, although no losses due to my reactive water change. I don't use any liquid carbo products now and shrimp seem to be fine.
if i were to user it again i'd add 1/4 dose and slowly build, but to be honest I won't touch it again where shrimp are concerned.


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## peter.k (15 Jul 2016)

Hi. I overdose green tropica, I overdose seachem flourish excel 4ml everyday for 80L tank, ei dosing potassium phosphate every other day and seachem iron every other day. Co2 dc green/yellow.  All amano and RCS are doing rly well. 
But. In previous setup I lost all of the amanos when i didn't do for 2-3 weeks 60-75% water change pre week. I was lazy and done just cca 25/30%. ( Now 50% for me is minimum.


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## PARAGUAY (16 Jul 2016)

aquascape1987 said:


> Hi, I'm fully versed in the concept behind ei, and I don't double dose as standard. This was to quickly bring the levels in the completely new tank water up to a reasonable level, earlier than waiting for 3 or 4 days dosing. I wanted the plants to have everything they needed to encourage quicker rooting and anchoring. I've replaced my trace mix now as well and stopped doing the liquid carbon, so am hoping that this solves the problem. So far it looks good with the shrimp I have left


On the initial rescape it could have been ammonia spikes changes to water quality therefore stressing the shrimps,I wouldn't think plants would suffer with a gradual increase of fertiliser nor the shrimps,I once added some new fish to a tank with shrimp ,water accidentally getting out of the bag ,new fish were fine but lost some shrimp put it down to change in the water,still not sure


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