Giving Up on Shrimp (or maybe not?)

[Nat N]

Hi guys,
Piece-of-fish and Foxfish,
Now you made me confused! (I dare to say that John S may be confused, too).
1. 1. Bioload – I totally agree that the bioload of Cherries is negligible but there are 6 Ottos in a 35 litre tank as well... and plants... One of the fundamental principles of dosing EI (as I read them) is a large (50%) water change every week to remove accumulated organics produced from plants and livestock. 30% water changes over time allowed these organics to accumulate (I think).
2. 2. Not using dechlorinator? Fine, Chlorine and Metals can be ignored (still thinking that some metals will leach into the water from the pipes, but ignoring that...) But what about Chloramine? It is used more and more often in the UK and I KNOW (I asked our water supplier) that Chlorimine is used here... I know Chlorimine should not be a problem in a heavily planted tank (as Darrel said) but how heavily planted is John’s Tank? Some stems and mosses – does not seem to be enough to absorb everything... or is it just me...
Darrel and Ady,
I agree with both of you (well, apart from the above – using dechlorinator that is where I am now confused...).
Darrel,
Yes, this is what I thought as well about the CO2 and the ferts – for that PARTICULAR tank. And thanks for the brief course on TDS!

 

[John S]

Thanks again everyone. I'm not confused Nat😉 . As I said, I did do some research into my set up before going with it and did see that people ran similar set ups with success. But like lots of things in this game what works for some doesn't for others. I feel less of a masochist knowing that people have succeeded with what I tried to do.

Incidentally the plants in this tank are Heteranthera Zosterifolia, Alternanthera Rosaefolia Mini, Round Pellia, Willow Moss and riccia.

Anyway, I think I'm going to restart. The CO2 is off and the light reduced. Tomorrow I will remove all the plants and wood and move the Ottos. I will give the substrate a good vacuum and the filter a clean. I will stop the ferts and then measure TDS daily once I'm back up and see if it can be stabilised a bit better. I will also only have lava rock in the tank.

So back to basics and step by step.

 

[basil]

Good to hear that! Keep at em 🙂

 

[John S]

So I drained the tank yesterday and cleaned. Some of the manzi had gone very soft and was splitting so I've thrown it out. Remaining shrimp were acclimatised and put back in.
TDS readings as follows:

Tap water 350
After filling tank and dechlorinating it was 385
This morning it is 392

Would these increases be expected?

Will continue to monitor and do small water changes.

 

[John S]

Well the TDS values are much more stable now. It's been at 375 for three days now. Changed 3 litres of water tonight. The remaining shrimp look far livelier than they have been.

Will keep the TDS stable and see if the population increases.

 

[LancsRick]

I'll buck the trend here and say I would have thought your general tank clearout is more likely to have solved things from a general health point of view. Cherries are incredibly hardy, and I've got them in tanks with TDS of 550, another small tank at 350, and they're happy as anything, and breeding. My gh and kh are extremely low, and I'm running purigen to keep the organics down.

Whatever the root cause, glad things are looking up for you 🙂.

 

[John S]

I'll buck the trend here and say I would have thought your general tank clearout is more likely to have solved things from a general health point of view. Cherries are incredibly hardy, and I've got them in tanks with TDS of 550, another small tank at 350, and they're happy as anything, and breeding. My gh and kh are extremely low, and I'm running purigen to keep the organics down.

Whatever the root cause, glad things are looking up for you 🙂.

Thanks Rick. You may be right, but I think this was possibly a combination of things. I'd still like to get this tank running hitech at some stage, but for now things are going well after the clean up and smaller more regular water changes. TDS is now never above 385 so that is one thing that is being controlled whether it was a contributor or not to the original problem.

 

[John S]

Quick update. The five shrimp that survived this were all female. Having had no further loses I added 10 more about a month ago from an ebay seller who lives near me. On going to do a water change tonight I've noticed some baby shrimp. Quite a few females are berried, so not a great surprise but beforehand I was seeing berried females but never any babies - so all looking good!