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Best Substrate For RCS?

Thanks again, sometime in the near future I will post an update, or I'll be coming back more stressed than ever lol, fingers crossed that's not the case. Thanks.
 
Good luck,I think it is a good choice going for the Ebi gold substrate it gives you a bit more control on your PH.Let us know when you get it.Important to keep an eye on PH and GH to see what it does with your tap water.Important to try and not let GH get below 5 as could affect moulting.Cheers Mark
 
Will do, she said she is going to order it over weekend, so hopefully arrive around next Thursday, and will take some readings Friday then every other day to get an idea :D

She also wants me to ask, is the brown definitely going to be ok? I presume its all the same stuff.
 
You would be better off with black it would be better for viewing for sure!I was looking on the site from one of our sponsers Freshwatershrimp and they only have Ebi Gold in black(I think).Maybe they do it in brown but black would make a red colouring stand out much better!Cheers Mark
 
Just to add I have had similar problems in my Ebi with Cherry shrimp and the more I read about the Fluval substrate the more I think it cant be coincidence. I have a walstad tank which is just compost and sand and my cherries are happy and breeding in there but not at all in my Ebi with stratum. I am going to strip it down and change it soon too.
 
Having not used Fluval Shrimp Stratum I did a bit of research.Fluval say not to mix Fluval Shrimp Stratum with any other substrate or gravel.It will drop the PH of the water slightly.If using tap water with a relatively high PH this effect will not last long causing the PH to go up again in the tank.After 3-4 months using this substrate with tap water the shrimps were not doing well,babies not surviving.Using RO water Fluval Shrimp Stratum the buffering effect lasted up to 8 months.The shrimps were more active,healthier and coloration was better.The RO used was PH 7 the soil dropped it to PH just over 6 and was remineralised.
Those are a few things I managed to find,Hope it helps someone:)
Cheers Mark
 
Check this link out, if these people don't know which is the best substrate for shrimp I don't know who does. Shrimp Substrate

If the link doesn't work check out the Sharnbrookshrimp site.

Hope it helps. Neale
 
Hey everyone,

Just to update I persuaded my girlfriend to go with the black colour, and explained it would be better for viewing the shrimp, even though on its own I think the brown looked better, but shrimp on a black substrate is hard to argue against, they will definitely stand out more. She ordered it today from Freshwatershrimp so hopefully it will arrive before Wednesday.

Cheers Paul for mentioning about your experience with the Fluval Stratum, if that's two people already on this forum and many others on the internet, then its rather strange indeed, would be interesting to know why the substrate gives people problems especially as the tank is designed for shrimp, I hope it is the problem anyway, would be annoying if our shrimp died this time around, at least I got you guys helping us this time around.

I will also give an update when we receive the substrate and its all in the tank, and then hopefully couple days after its settled, I will get some accurate readings and hopefully they will be more shrimp ideal.

Not sure if I should post this in this thread or make another, but I don't see why not, how would you recommend we acclimate the shrimp this time around? I don't really want to do the drip method, I can understand its probably the best method, the last methods I have used with great success was the bucket and cup method found here: Acclimating Shrimp .:. Instructions on acclimating shrimp to a new aquarium environment thus preventing shock or death. and with the RCS I purchased from my LFS I just left the bag to float in the tank with lights out for about 5-10 minutes then gently released them all, when I did do my research I mostly found for with Cherry shrimp you can do pretty much any method as there Cherry shrimp lol. But would be good to hear what other people here mostly do.

My girlfriend also purchased some Charcoal bamboo shelters which arrived today, literally Charcoal, I don't think we will be using them, to my surprise there is not much information on them out there.
I was thinking this time around we should probably buy some moss, and a Java fern, can anyone recommend where we can buy Java moss that comes with a safe wire mesh? the last thing I want is a mesh that leaks toxins in to the water, as I read some people have had issues with that. She would like to lay it on the substrate to give it a carpeting look, and the Java fern will be attached to our bog wood. I'm not even sure I want to put the wood in there, I've become so paranoid now, I want everything to be different.

Any other tips or advice would be great, I think I read for the first 3 weeks its also best to just top the water up, rather than do a w/c so I was thinking we could take that approach? also with water changes I was thinking we will just go with 10% weekly instead of 20%... also what's the benefits if we left the bucket of water over night? I see some people do this as-well.

Also what should the feeding pattern be this time around?, I probably fed around 12 Fluval shrimp granules to 10 shrimp when we first started, and that was every other day with a day with no food. I also now read some people don't even feed there shrimp, the one shrimp we got now I feed him like once a week.

Also to add with our last batch of RCS my girlfriend did purchase 3 otto's, should we remove them? I did do a lot of research on this as-well, as obviously 2 batches of shrimp died, she was bored looking at nothing, funny enough I would see the RCS sitting on top of the otto's just cleaning them it looked like lol.... I know I'm asking a lot of questions and going into fine detail, but I just want to keep things basic and simple as I can. To reduce any risks and any stress on the shrimp , or even if someone can spot any mistakes in our previous routine.

I see on sites such as ebay , people who sell there shrimp, seem to always have a air pump running, I've got a air pump going in there right now, I put it in last week as I thought it couldn't hurt, there wasn't much else to look at which was another reason. So anyone run air pumps 24-7?

Any advice or tips would be great, I've pretty much researched everything from head to tail, but as I'm here and you all keep shrimp, I'm sure real advice is better than most likely outdated articles.

Thanks in advance.
 
Use some air line with a clip on it to do drip acclimatising, it really is the best way and you can go away and leave it for hrs. I have a wee tap thing gor controlling air flow that I use to control drip speed. Make sure you leave the tank to settle for a couple of weeks after adding your ebi to let bacteria colonise it. Alot of us use bacterial products such as genchem biozyme and mosura bt9 etc to help get good bacterial colonies and biofilm for shrimp to graze on.
There is a good ebay seller called winzeta (or similar) who sells excellent shrimp products, mesh for mosses and moss itself. When buying plants for a shrimp tank you must ensure they are shrimp safe ie not been treated with pesticides to kill snails etc as it will also kill shrimp. Winzetas husband keeps alot of high quality shrimp so they know whats good.

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10% waterchange is what most of us do. I dechlorinate the water in a 5ltr water bottle and then leave it overnight or sometimes all week. I then get the correct tds and gh in the bottle before taking 5ltr out my tank and replacing with the stuff in the bottle. Many shrimp keepers swear by air pumps. Can't to any harm.

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I'd feed maybe twice a week. Overfeeding may have polluted the tank and given shrimp bacterial infection.

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Thanks for being so helpful, I will look into the drip method and try to familiarise my self with it, I presume the shrimp won't be stressed sitting in a bucket for say 3 hours? That's why I never tried that method even though its highly recommended.

We will also also give it a few weeks before we buy any shrimp, and hopefully I can keep the filter alive, I've had success before when upgrading my own tank.

I found the seller on ebay, so will defiantly look into ordering some things, there wasn't much variety with mosses, but I've always liked the look of the weeping moss, I hope its as easy as other mosses and the Java fern he sells looks nice.

Looks like 10% water change it is then, and will keep the air pump running... and keep the feeding to twice a week and see how it goes.
 
Good advice from Lindy:)Drip aclimatise the shrimp is a much better and safer way of introducing them to the tank.If you just float the bag and release them after a bit you could lose shrimp quickly or after a few days due to stress and damage.I usually drip my neocaradinia(red cherry/Sakura etc) for about 4 hours using air line and the plastic airflow controller to get a pretty slow drip.
 
When you put your new substrate in the tank it will be very important to monitor parameters of the water to see how it adjusts your tap water PH and GH.Just to be carefull these levels don't drop too much.You don't want GH going below 5.As Lindy mentioned getting a build up of micro organisms in the tank/substrate is important,I use Genchem Biozyme and Shirakura Chi Ebi to do this,there are many other products that do the same.While you are cycling the tank put some cattapa,guava,banana or other suitable leaves in the tank it will also give the biofilm something to grow on.
Aeration in a shrimp tank is a good thing in my opinion,I have a spray bar which I have raised above the surface slightly in my shrimp tanks.I have noticed the shrimp to be more active and they look healthier too.Cheers Mark
 
Just a quick update as promised.

I've added the Ebi Gold, nice estimate with the 4cm covering Mark lol, more like double that, when I put the bag in I had to step back and think twice, I was going to remove half, but have now gone with a slope scape, so got about 4 inches at the back (10cm) and 2 inches at the front (5cm), actually looks quite good now I've got use to it being so deep, so am happy I did that. I've never done a slope scape before or anything unusual.

My only concern is how many litres I have lost from the tank, when we had the fluval stratum it was only like a inch deep all over, we needed 2nd bag really but we just never got around to it, + then we had shrimp so was to late.

Would it be safe to say my 10% water change is probably going to be around the 2 litre mark? instead of the 3 litres, Its probably lost 3-4 litres? so 2 litre would be the safest bet or 2.5? or is that to little?

Also I'm not sure this has been mentioned, I did double check, what would you say is the best temp for cherry shrimp, I use to keep the tank at 25c.

I won't do no tests for at least 48 hours, and then I will continue testing probably every two days just to make sure all water parameters are stable and post back here.

Oh I did quickly check the TDS, its at 198 at the moment, so its already buffering the tank, its the lowest I've ever seen it.

Also to add on the EBI gold packaging it says to do a 10-20% water change every 20-30 days, if this is made by specialists why do they recommend that and not the weekly?
 
Better too much substrate than too little. Temp wise I'd say around 21degrees is plenty but you could probably keep them cooler than that.

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Hey Lindy,
Cheers for the quick reply!

I guess 25c was a little high then, I will aim for around 21c then.

I've been scanning the invert forum, and I guess everyone on here keeps CRS mostly lol, like I mentioned earlier my girlfriend and I want to start small, and work our way up. If we do have success with Cherry shrimp then obviously I will need to educate my self on RO water and re-mineralising it, but this could be way into late next year :(

I hope you can help or someone can just give me some brief advice, I see RO units are quite expensive and I've never needed one so I've never did that much research but did have a look today, there expensive! Anyway I presume there aim is to remove all the total dissolved solids from the water? chemicals etc and then we re-mineralise the RO water so the shrimp have the minimum amount of compounds they need? not sure compounds is the right word here, but with the shrimp products out there it adds the stuff they need in the water and the RO unit removes everything we don't need.

How hard is it to grasp the concept of using RO etc? can anyone pick it up? or is it complex/hard to get to grip with? I read they have to be plumped in, I don't think my family would be happy with that, we ain't got taps coming out the walls lol, and they won't want a RO unit in there kitchen, so can they be portable?

Is it easy to know/ find out when parts need replacing, how long does one last for? are they expensive to keep maintaining. I hope someone can answer some of that for me as I would really like to know.

Another alternative was I read some people buy RO water, if I'm only replacing 2 litres a week, if I purchased 25 litres RO for say £3 I read that was the rate somewhere, it would last around 4 months, how long can I store RO water? does it go stale? but I hope someone can let me know about the RO units, as would be interested to know if its complex or quite easy, I didn't want my girlfriend to waste money in the future for something I have no idea how to run, and its costs to keep running etc, especially if its not portable.

Thanks in advance, obviously this would not come to light for a long time, as our goal is to get lots of cherry shrimp, I mean as much as the tank can handle so we can be the one's to find them homes for a change!, I hope that with everyone's help from here, we will become shrimp breeding professionals lol, lets not get our hopes up though with our luck =\
 
Not sure about your tank specs mate!I used 3.75 liters of substrate in a 25cmx25cm tank (20L) giving aprox 5 to 6 cm covering!Note substrate compacts very slightly.So a 5 liter bag should have been on the nail for your tank depending on dimensions obviously:confused:
 
Hey Mark, The substrate looks ace anyway, gives a nice slope and a good look to the tank.

My girlfriend today spent about £20 just on Mosses, Anubias nana petite attached to bog wood , round Pellia, I also gave her some Java fern, its just a cutting so will have to wait a long time for that to grow, and some Staurogyne repens. She also purchased some catapa leafs, alder cones, banana leaf, I told her to avoid buying food, as we got some fluval shrimp granules and this time around we will be feeding prob 2x a week, and they can eat the biofilm on everything else.

The only problem with storing RO for 2 weeks is we would have visit LFS quite regulator and there not that close, would RO water not store for a month? I'm hoping we won't even need to go the RO route, but as mentioned above just want to learn, and if RO could be stored for long, then it would make things simple. If not I would rather buy a unit, when we do go on to harder shrimp if it can't be stored.

I have not tested the tanks GH/KH yet, the TDS is around 174 this morning, and I reckon the PH is about 7, hard to tell with the colour chart, but when the TDS stops dropping and PH, then I will test GH/KH don't want to waste that kit right away, so will wait a bit longer then do frequent testing on that.

The loose air stone in the tank don't look that great, so was also considering buying a nice black sponge air filter, just to give extra filtration along side the extra oxygen.

Should we take condensation into the water changes? I reckon were going to lose about a litre a week. So that's an extra litre added on to a 10% water change of 2 litres, 3 Litres might be to much.

Now its just a waiting game to get the tank to mature a bit, not sure how long this is going to take, the shrimp and oto's in there now are doing fine, the shrimp was on death doors for the first 24 hours, upside down, couldn't stand, I felt so bad for the guy especially as he is like our solider but I had no where else to put him, I did try my hardest to keep the filter alive, he has also lasted longer than any shrimp we've ever had! I hear people saying cherry shrimp are indestructible, I don't believe them with our luck, but this shrimp is living up to it lol, he seems alright now, and is eating happily. Hopefully with each day the PH lowers, if there is any Ammonia it will be less toxic. Surprised he has not moulted.

cheers again.
 
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