# Keeping shrimp - basic questions



## Reuben (23 Aug 2013)

After some consideration between Cherry or Amano shrimp, I am thinking of going with the Cherry shrimp.

A few questions;

Tank is high tech Co2 injection and Excel, dosing EI, moderate light, and large water changes.

1.  Is it okay to continue to dose Excel?  I use 6ml in a 125L tank once per day.

2.  Can people recommend a good solution to stopping shrimp getting in the filter intake that won't slow flow?  

3.  I often perform large (80%) water changes - at least 2x per week- is this an issue with shrimp?  To my thinking it will be a good thing as they will be in cleaner water but I read the odd thing about needing to keep parameters 'stable'  

4. I have no algae at all so what foods should I be putting in for them?  

5. How many should I get as a basic stocking level, is 10 about right?!

Thanks
Reuben


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## AshRolls (23 Aug 2013)

1) Yes, though you are on the limit as you are overdosing. 
2) The wire mesh shrimp guards that aqua essentials sell are good.
3) The shrimp won't like the large water changes as they are very sensitive to changes in TDS. Even hardy shrimps like cherries would get cheesed off / die by big swings in water condition! A TDS pen (£10 or less on eBay) is a good investment for shrimp keeping, matching the TDS of the water you're replacing to that in the tank. Even then I wouldn't think such large water changes will be compatible but someone else may be along and say otherwise?
4) Food that sinks (nettle sticks / spinach sticks off ebay) is good for shrimp as the fish tend to nab the flake stuff.
5) 10 is a good start if you want to start a breeding colony off.


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## roadmaster (23 Aug 2013)

Mine do well with 50% water change each week and algae wafer's,
New life spectrum pellet's for large fish.
I don't use CO2 so cannot comment on what effect's Excel or CO2 fluctuation's that twice weekly water changes might bring would/could have on them.
I use Foam over filter intakes and there is alway's a few shrimp gathered here feeding on that which collect's on the foam.


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## Reuben (23 Aug 2013)

Okay thank's for the replies.  I'm reluctant to reduce the water changes as I'm fairly sure it is helping a lot in keeping the tank clean and free of algae.  



AshRolls said:


> hen I wouldn't think such large water changes will be compatible but someone else may be along and say otherwise?


Anyone want to chip in on this?  What is the verdict?
Thanks


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## Michael W (23 Aug 2013)

Cherry shrimps in general are more hardy than CRS/CBS etc but we must take into consideration that Cherries have been around a long long time and lots of inbreeding and such has happened over the years in attempt to produce different colour variations and stronger colouring. This will no doubt affect their ability to tolerate massive swings in parameters from things like 80% water changes. I'm not saying that all the cherries out there are weak but it might be something to think about. If 80% water changes are a must to you then you can perhaps drip the water back into the tank slowly in order to avoid too much stress for the shrimp.

One thing to really take in mind is the acclimation process. I recommend you to drip acclimate the shrimps as long as possible. I had brought so bee shrimps from a member of PFK and I dripped them for 6 hours to ensure they move into my tank with as little stress as possible.

Michael.


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## kirk (23 Aug 2013)

Hi, I have found cherries to be pretty hardy along with rillis. Although I was concearned when we had the hot weather at tank rose to 29. Luckily we didn't loose any that I'm aware of. We treat our fish/shrimp to cucumber carrots, bits of potato along with the wafers and dried leaves with antibacterial properties.  Shrimp will treat themselves too, anything that dies will get polished off.


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## Reuben (23 Aug 2013)

Thanks for the help.

It seems as though my main problem might be the potential problem with changes in TDS caused by my water change regime/high tech setup.   The fish (16 small tetras) are in good health and I was hoping the shrimp would like the clean water too.

I realise I will have to acclimatise them very slowly when I first get them. But once they are in my water I was hoping they would be fine with me changing it for fresh water?

My water supply is a private supply from an underground spring, and is not chemically treated in any way.  It goes through a 5 micron filter then a UV before getting pressurized to 3 bar and supplying my house.  This means I can connect a hose to the tap and mix hot and cold (no the hot is not stored in a copper cylinder) to 23 degrees then refill my tank fairly quickly ( about 5 -10 mins).  I know I could probably do this with mains, but I do like the fact it has no chlorine etc..  

Final thoughts on how much of an issue doing regular large water changes would be to shrimp?  Surely they would 'like' the clean water?  Plus when they are in the wild rain fall and run off must change the water parameters (TDS) too?

Thanks.


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## Michael W (23 Aug 2013)

This is a very good read regarding to TDS and shrimp keeping I hope it may be of use for you.

ShrimpNow !!! - Quarantining and Acclimating New Shrimp Properly


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## Iain Sutherland (23 Aug 2013)

Hey Reuben, cherries are pretty tough buggers and dont really seem fazed by much aside the the usuals that cause issues with all stock like low o2, high nitrites etc some even found there way into my garden daphnia bin back in march,  tds 600+ and heavily fluctuating temps, have even seen a few shrimlets this week.

Excel shouldnt harm them at the level you are dosing but reproduction may effected as the shrimplets are the ones that dont like excel.

Changing 80% water twice a week will likely not be too much of a problem, many people have high techs running 2 x 50% changes a week with large colonies.

Freshwatershrimp sell the shrimp guards for your inlet which dont effect flow much at all as long as you keep them clean.

Dont feed the shrimp at all.  Until you have a large population (very large as the tank is 125ltr)  they will do what they are designed for, scavenging. While you may have no visable algae the spores are still in your tank all over your plants, glass, substrate etc in the biofilm which is the main staple of s shrimps diet along with left over fish food, detritus.....

The more you buy the quicker a colony will be established, you dont say if you have fish but if you do (depending of what fish) a good proportion of juveniles will be predated.  However as long as there is adequate cover the population will go on.  In my old tank i thought there were just a few adult left that hadnt been eaten by the 30+ barbs but come break down about more than 200 appeared.

All the best, if your tank maintenance is good the shrimp will likely thrive.


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## sciencefiction (24 Aug 2013)

You are going to have to see if it works for you with your current maintenance and other individual factors.  As already mentioned cherrys and rilis are hardier even compared to some fish, very tough guys. But they are inverts and will be easier affected by liquid carbon and injected carbon. Large water changes to 50% don't bother them one bit based on my experience and I pour it directly from the tap dechlorinating straight into the tank.  I can't tell for 80% but if one does so many water changes, tap and tank water should be nearly the same unless there're some other additives involved in the tap like CO2 or large ammonia levels, chlorine, copper, etc...My tap water has so much CO2 that it looks like soda water. With 80% water change my fish went gasping until I put a large air pump to gas it off, that was on top of a bit of liquid carbon overdosing that morning. So I pour the water from a distance in the tank to make is splash and hopefully outgass the majority of CO2(ph is also largely different because of that)

A coarse sponge works great as a shrimp guard in my opinion and doesn't slow the flow but if you get a big population of shrimp be prepared to wash off tens of them by accident. I ended up with 30+ newborns in the bucket of water I washed the sponges in the other day so I had to pour the dirty water back.

Shrimp are scavengers so they don't particularly eat just algae, they eat everything, meaty stuff including. They'll kill each other for blood worms and brineshrimp but they'll appreciate all types of fruit and veg too.  They love manufactured foods of all kinds as well.  They'll basically go for everything else before they go for algae. They multiply faster when they are fed too and not just left on an algae diet.  They are like snails in that respect.
I started with 5 shrimp two of which were females and in a few months I stopped counting them, red carpet at feeding time  But besides corydoras there were no other fish in the tank so it seems almost all shrimplets survived.


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## Reuben (24 Aug 2013)

Hi Iain,  

Which were you thinking of I can't find them



Iain Sutherland said:


> Freshwatershrimp sell the shrimp guards for your inlet which dont effect flow much at all as long as you keep them clean.


 



sciencefiction said:


> I started with 5 shrimp two of which were females and in a few months I stopped counting them, red carpet at feeding time But besides corydoras there were no other fish in the tank so it seems almost all shrimplets survived.


Yikes this does put me off a bit, but hopefully the fish will eat the hatchlings!  

Is having so many not a strain on the bioload of the tank, like having loads of fish would be?


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## sciencefiction (24 Aug 2013)

> Is having so many not a strain on the bioload of the tank, like having loads of fish would be?


Yes, it's off putting. Some people can't keep them alive, some get overrun with them. But most fish would snack on shrimplets so it depends on the tank.
  I've no way of knowing how much strain they put on the bioload but I have so many they are now in 4 tanks. The shrimp dedicated tank is well filtered for a low tech and I do weekly large water changes so I haven't had a problem despite the numbers. I would presume the food we feed them is the most to worry about, but then again I feed them lots of food daily and still no issues. The food disappears quickly. They jump on my hands and would eat them if they could.


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## AshRolls (24 Aug 2013)

I wonder if large water changes and shrimp sensitivity are down to the natural tap water of an area. If you're in a soft water area full EI would raise the TDS during the week and the water change would then cause quite a big 'reset' back down, upsetting the shrimpies. If you're in a hard water area the TDS is already high from tap and doesn't drop by as much at the water change, so the shrimp are happier? Just a hunch / hypothesis, I don't know if that's true or not.

I match the TDS of my replaced tap water to the tank (180) as it comes out of the tap at 65 here and since doing that the shrimp in my tank have been a lot happier. I'm running low(ish) tech energy levels though so no fert salt dosing during the week.


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## sciencefiction (24 Aug 2013)

> If you're in a soft water area full EI would raise the TDS during the week and the water change would then cause quite a big 'reset' back down, upsetting the shrimpies.


 Not really, ferts raise the TDS even of hard water so water change would reset it back to tap water levels in both scenarios.  I don't dose ferts in any of the shrimp tanks besides a very occassional small dose once a month or two if I notice a defficiency of some sort but I often don't need to.


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## AshRolls (24 Aug 2013)

sciencefiction said:


> Not really, ferts raise the TDS even of hard water so water change would reset it back to tap water levels in both scenarios.


 
The reset is the question though.

Assume two scenarios :-

Softwater, where during the week EI raises the TDS from 100 to 200, and the weekly water change then drops it back to 100 again.
Hardwater, where during the week EI raises the TDS from 300 to 400, and the weekly water change then drops it back to 300 again.
Is a reset in softwater (ie 200 to 100) the same on the shrimp as a reset in hardwater (ie 400 to 300) ?

I'm following ceg's advice here and trying to fully question my knowledge so that I properly understand, sorry if I'm being obtuse!


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## sciencefiction (24 Aug 2013)

> The reset is the question though. Is a reset in softwater (ie 180 to 80) harder on the shrimp than a reset in hardwater (ie 400 to 300) ?


I never heard of that making a difference but I'd guess 80ppm of TDS is quite low for some species of shrimp so maybe they can't live in that low TDS to start with. Dosing magnesium and calcium as part of the plant regime is probably what's helping them survive.


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## Reuben (25 Aug 2013)

Any pointers on a shrimp guard for the filter intake that won't reduce flow?
thanks.


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## Michael W (25 Aug 2013)

A bit of DIY   There are some ready made ones if you search around but nothing beats a good old DIY


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