Welcome ricksza

[ricksza]

Shrimp Keepers Forum welcomes ricksza.

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skfadmin

[ricksza]

About myself: I started fish tanks about 50 years ago, back when we just let water sit overnight then put fish in. I started with tropical fish, raising fancy tail guppies for fun and profit to allow me my prize & joy; My Red Belly Piranha. I had him for about 6 years until he died then shut down all my tanks. Fast forward 40 years, I'm retired, just remodeled my home and decided it needed a fish tank. 7 months ago I picked up a 205 L corner tank and stocked it as a nice community tank. A lot of learning about new (to me) practices and procedures. After changing gravel to sand & putting in plants, everything is going too smooth so I looked into shrimp.

 I started my shrimp tank 4 months ago with a divided 37 L. I have Sakura Red and Blue Dreams. Made a few mistakes along the way, but the Reds have doubled in numbers and the Blue have tripled so I decided to go in with both feet. I just purchased 2 - 75 L tanks and a heavy duty rack to hold them plus a couple of 37 L for culls and quarantine. I'm starting to get all the necessary equipment (filters, pumps, lights, substrate, plants, etc) ordered. I'm hoping to have the new tanks inhabited by October.

[sdlTBfanUK]

You are doing very well with your first time keeping shrimps. It is so easy to get carried away and just getting one more tank, then another! It is good that you have a long term plan and aren't rushing anything.

Had you thought of putting the culls in the big fish tank instead, so they can help keep that clean, add another interest etc. Unless you have big fish (can't see any in your picture) or aggressive fish it should work fine, especially as they are probably unlikely to be good colours so not attracting the fishes attention. Any tiny shrimplets may sometimes get eaten! I have cherry shrimps in my 2 tanks with fish and it works really well. 1 tank is a fighter and he just looks at the shrimps quizzically (not seen him go after any, even small ones). I gave a load of culls to a  friend to feed his fish some years ago and he has had a colony in his huge tank ever since. Anyway just a thought? Though what would you then use the planned cull tank for I wonder?????

Simon

[ricksza]

8 hours ago, sdlTBfanUK said:

.......Had you thought of putting the culls in the big fish tank instead, so they can help keep that clean, add another interest etc. .....Simon

Great idea. I do have plenty of hiding places in there and I was thinking of eventually adding shrimp into there. This way I could see if my current fish will accept them or see them as food.

There are plenty of people in my area that would gladly buy culls, naturally at a reduced price.

Edited June 22, 2019 by ricksza

[sdlTBfanUK]

Even if a few get eaten it is all part of nature and why run a tank for shrimp you don't want anyway, thats one I haven't yet fathomed? As you say you wouldn't get much for them anyway so it probably isn't worth that hassle either.

Weirdly, the culls I put in the betta tank are breeding some wonderful bright orange shrimps, bizarre as they all started off as red cherry then reverted to brown (wild) hence I put them in the betta tank thinking they are well camouflaged. But the betta still leave the bright orange shrimps alone, I thought he would go after those being so in your face bright orange!

The brown culls I gave my friend are producing some bright red ones apparently, he has fish that are easily big enough to eat them should they want. You'll need to find something now to put in the cull tank instead, isn't life a b**ch?

A fellow UK member here has mollies like you and he keeps his good shrimps with them?

Simon