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Taiwan Bee not so nano

Iain Sutherland

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UKAPS Team
Joined
7 Jul 2011
Messages
3,744
Location
Cambridge
Having had my old Taiwan bee breeding tank for 4 1/2 years and given that the new kitchen is finished it seemed fair to find a spot for a wide 60 as a new breeding tank.

Tank 60x45x30
Chihiros light running at 30%
Eheim liberty 200 hob filter, a second Eheim liberty 120 will be added when the current tank is broken down
Mix of substrate, mostly tropica soil I think
Maple leaf rock
Manzanita branches and twigs
TDS 145 RO remineralised with Bee Shrimp mineral gh+
Temp 21c
Ferts are Tropica specialised 2.5ml daily
Water change 10ltrs a week for now and biweekly in a few weeks once established.

Plants
Monte Carlo
Crypt pigmaea
Chladoflora moss balls
Bucephalandra theia
Unknown brown crypt
Needle leaf microsorum

Right hand piece of wood floated so will sort once soaked...
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Gorgeous kitchen finish!

The hardscape choices seem to reflect the kitchen colours :)

Great to have you back
 
Gorgeous kitchen finish!

The hardscape choices seem to reflect the kitchen colours :)

Great to have you back
Thanks alto, I built the extension and kitchen myself from scratch with a little help from you tube. Concrete counters are a pain in the ass!!

Hardscape choice is coincidental, just what I had knocking around.

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Quick update..

Day 2 saw a huge bacterial bloom, the water was like milk so gave it a 100% water change and all good since.

Day 3 I noticed some diatoms appearing as expected, just some brown dust on the Monte carlo so threw in 150 shrimp.

Day 4 Diatoms no more, shrimp having a ball and tidying everything up.

Monte Carlo is doing well, new horizontal runners appearing so will trim all vertical stems from when it was planted over the weekend and give a little mechanical assistance ( press it down) to ensure the runners root.
Few crypt leaves melting from the move so trimming them out daily when seen.
Will also move as many of the remaining shrimp I can catch from the 40 over the weekend and break that tank down. The best method is still putting a big net in the tank with some food, scooping out every 20 minutes. The hundreds of babies, maybe 1-2mm will probably largely be lost.

Also made a rooky error in that the wood is a bit close to the glass to get my oaf hands in to clean the glass. As all the wood is bonded with the rock via superglue and cigarette filters I will have to live with it.

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Tanks looks amazing, loved your last journal.

Would like to ask a few questions please?
- do you like 1 ehiem Liberty 200 would be enough on a ADA 60p, do it need a shrimp guard?
Are you still breeding Taiwan bees or just hybirds now? Do you get much survival of Taiwans if so
- when you water change are you dropping it in or just pouring it staright in.

Thanks

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Tanks looks amazing, loved your last journal.

Would like to ask a few questions please?
- do you like 1 ehiem Liberty 200 would be enough on a ADA 60p, do it need a shrimp guard?
Are you still breeding Taiwan bees or just hybirds now? Do you get much survival of Taiwans if so
- when you water change are you dropping it in or just pouring it staright in.

Thanks

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Hey, glad you liked the journal.

If it's for a low tech shrimp tank the liberty 200 would be fine. I would happily run this tank just with the 200 which has more volume and bigger footprint than a 60p, it's only because I have both I'll run both. That and I want to keep the ficus on the filter again which is a nightmare to move as it's rooted in the filter pads. It does need a shrimp guard but goes fit straight on.

Depends how you define Two bees, as I understand it any shrimps with the Tai bee gene are Tai bees, the hybrids are the shadows, bolts, smiley face, king kongs etc. Most of mine are effectively crs, cbs and smiley faces now. Will get some blue bolts and shadows soon as the gene pool is limited after 5 years of breeding in isolation. Hopefully start selling again in a few months.

At water change i just fill with RO at tap temp and then remineralise the whole tank to 140ish. The temperature change and tds change stimulates breeding the same a rain fall in the wild.

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Your journal was amazing, if you have time check mine out of my 60p

I was referring to king Kong, blubolt babies about your survival and breeding rate.

My 60p is a a Taiwan bee, tatiibee tank but seeing your now I change it to more of a low tech scape.

When you say about your water change, I'm a little confused on your method, do you put straight 0tds in your tank then bring the whole tank back to the right TDs by adding your salts to the tank? Your not pre mixing before hand then poring the correct TDs water in.
Hey, glad you liked the journal.

If it's for a low tech shrimp tank the liberty 200 would be fine. I would happily run this tank just with the 200 which has more volume and bigger footprint than a 60p, it's only because I have both I'll run both. That and I want to keep the ficus on the filter again which is a nightmare to move as it's rooted in the filter pads. It does need a shrimp guard but goes fit straight on.

Depends how you define Two bees, as I understand it any shrimps with the Tai bee gene are Tai bees, the hybrids are the shadows, bolts, smiley face, king kongs etc. Most of mine are effectively crs, cbs and smiley faces now. Will get some blue bolts and shadows soon as the gene pool is limited after 5 years of breeding in isolation. Hopefully start selling again in a few months.

At water change i just fill with RO at tap temp and then remineralise the whole tank to 140ish. The temperature change and tds change stimulates breeding the same a rain fall in the wild.

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Hey your 60p looks great.

In regards to the hybrids, it's been a long time since I've had anything interesting I know off but then I haven't really been able to see in the tank for a year or so. It was really neglected for a long time.
The genetics in the shrimp are also pretty poor, hence I'll sell off a load of them soon and get some new genes, I was contemplating starting again with some shadows only but decided against it for now. I did kull a few dozen very pale ones during the move, by way of throwing then in the paludarium, they may survive... tds is 380 in there.

Yes exactly that for water change. I used to pre mix but given I only change 10% it's makes no odds, TDS will drop from 180 or so to 130 then remineralised to 140/150. About once a month I'll do a bigger water change, maybe 40% to ensure the mineral content gets refreshed for the shrimp, I'll probably pre mix this.
Also have a mineral stone in the back and a few catappa leaves tucked behind the filter intake for grazing.

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Thanks for taking your time out to answer my questions and look at my journal, I look forward to watching this journal and the shrimp you breed, when your selling next I could be interested in buying a load off you.
Hey your 60p looks great.

In regards to the hybrids, it's been a long time since I've had anything interesting I know off but then I haven't really been able to see in the tank for a year or so. It was really neglected for a long time.
The genetics in the shrimp are also pretty poor, hence I'll sell off a load of them soon and get some new genes, I was contemplating starting again with some shadows only but decided against it for now. I did kull a few dozen very pale ones during the move, by way of throwing then in the paludarium, they may survive... tds is 380 in there.

Yes exactly that for water change. I used to pre mix but given I only change 10% it's makes no odds, TDS will drop from 180 or so to 130 then remineralised to 140/150. About once a month I'll do a bigger water change, maybe 40% to ensure the mineral content gets refreshed for the shrimp, I'll probably pre mix this.
Also have a mineral stone in the back and a few catappa leaves tucked behind the filter intake for grazing.

Sent from my SM-G950F using Tapatalk

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Had a slight drama with this in that the heater locked on over night, when I went to fish out a dead shrimp I spotted it was like a bath! 27c and about 50 shrimp dead in the end. I'm glad it didn't wipe them out entirely and the plants.
Other than that all is good, I got time to break down the old tank so the second hob is moved over now along with a new Eheim 50w heater.


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Absolute bummer about the heater and shrimp, hopefully the one that are still alive haven't been affected to badly.

I've redone my shrimp tank in to a low tech centre island type aquascape, it's running a Twinstar 600 dimmed down, I bout some tropica fertiliser to use as I seen you and a few other use it. I was wondering if you could advise my on how much I should be using in my tank, I see in your old journal that you was adding 1ml or 1.5ml at times was that a guess when using the pump on the bottle? I says it uses 2 ml per pump on the description.

I'm just a little confused on it as I normally use EI on high tech tank.

Sorry to spam your thread.
Had a slight drama with this in that the heater locked on over night, when I went to fish out a dead shrimp I spotted it was like a bath! 27c and about 50 shrimp dead in the end. I'm glad it didn't wipe them out entirely and the plants.
Other than that all is good, I got time to break down the old tank so the second hob is moved over now along with a new Eheim 50w heater.


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Absolute bummer about the heater and shrimp, hopefully the one that are still alive haven't been affected to badly.

I've redone my shrimp tank in to a low tech centre island type aquascape, it's running a Twinstar 600 dimmed down, I bout some tropica fertiliser to use as I seen you and a few other use it. I was wondering if you could advise my on how much I should be using in my tank, I see in your old journal that you was adding 1ml or 1.5ml at times was that a guess when using the pump on the bottle? I says it uses 2 ml per pump on the description.

I'm just a little confused on it as I normally use EI on high tech tank.

Sorry to spam your thread.

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No problem, of course you can use dry ferts, i just like the ease. I have the Tropica ferts in an old ADA fert bottle as i have 5ltr tub of it and that pump is 1.5ml.
Id suggest a 2ml pump a day and see how it goes, if all seems well dose the same every other day and then see if you get any negative effect. As little ferts as possible is the goal as it will raise TDS which should be kept around 140 - 150 , 180 max as breeding slows down the higher it is.
 
Livestock nightmare at the moment in this.. continued to lose shrimp after my last post and unsure why as all should be well with mature filters, parameters good and temp stabilised. Currently thinking that maybe it's bacterial which continuous loses usually are, maybe the tank move induced it all. Thankfully haven't lost any for a few days now so fingers crossed its over with however numbers are now decimated!

Also had a water flea/seed shrimp invasion... unsure if this could be related? Literally everything is covered in them and now also free swimming! They have always been present in the substrate of my shrimp tanks but this is next level... every spot you see is a flea...

May have to drop some of my ember tetras in to sort it out, just worried I'll never get them out again with the hardscape
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Maybe add some tiny fish such as spotted rasbora. Embers may snack on your shrimp...
 
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