Dying shrimp

[kvinnyy]

I made the switch to ro water + remineralising with diy sulphate mix (ca, mg , potassium) because I was seeing less activity during the winter and thought it would be my water. My parameters initially were:

pH: 6.8

gH: 3

kH: 2

Temp: 18-20c

TDS: 140-160

Every so often, I would see shrimp deaths so I thought it was a good idea to increase it a bit. It was also getting colder and at one point, temperatures in the tank reached as low as 16c. This scared me and I put a heater in there to get the temperature up to 22c from the average 18c. I also put another montmorillonite mineral rock in there in attempts to increase calcium and magnesium levels a bit. But my shrimp started dying and I don't know if it was the sudden temperature swing or the mineral rock.

It's been about a month but I still keep seeing deaths. So I gave the ro + remineralising a go.

For the past week I have been dripping water that I mixed into the filter at the rate of about 1 drop per second. The water I was dripping in has gH of 6, kH of 0, TDS of 140. I have managed to raise the gH of the tank to 4 now but my shrimp are spazzing out and jumping all over the place and dying. I don't know what I should do now.

My tank parameters now are:

pH: 6.8

gH: 4

kH: 0-1

Temp: 23

TDS: 168 - 175 (rises during the night, don't know why)

Ammonia: 0

Nitrite: 0

Nitrate: 0-5 ppm

I have a 20 gallon tank if that helps and at the moment I'm dripping ro water into the tank to try to lower the TDS to 140-150.

Edited September 25, 2019 by kvinnyy

[jayc]

I cannot see anything immediately wrong with your water parameters.

What shrimp are we talking about here?

And where are you located?

Shrimp spazzing out means that there is something toxic in the water that is affecting them, unlike a wrong water parameter which is usually a slow affect on the shrimp. If it's getting critical, get the shrimp out into a temporary container and perform a 100% water change asap. Including the water in external filters. Refill the empty tank with your RO water treated to the correct parameters. Then reintroduce the shrimp by slowly drip acclimation.

Can you post a picture of the whole tank? Is there a lid on the tank?

Describe what else you have in the tank as detailed as possible. List all decorations, plants, rocks, wood, etc.

Does your tank run on air pumps? And has anyone sprayed insecticides (fly or roach sprays) nearby lately?

 

Can you show us what was used to mix the ca, mg, K? And what ratios of each?

Apologies for all the questions, just trying to get a picture here to see if we can help you.

Edited September 25, 2019 by jayc

[kvinnyy]

 

1 hour ago, jayc said:

I cannot see anything immediately wrong with your water parameters.

1) What shrimp are we talking about here?

2) And where are you located?

Shrimp spazzing out means that there is something toxic in the water that is affecting them, unlike a wrong water parameter which is usually a slow affect on the shrimp. If it's getting critical, get the shrimp out into a temporary container and perform a 100% water change asap. Including the water in external filters. Refill the empty tank with your RO water treated to the correct parameters. Then reintroduce the shrimp by slowly drip acclimation.

3) Can you post a picture of the whole tank? Is there a lid on the tank?

4) Describe what else you have in the tank as detailed as possible. List all decorations, plants, rocks, wood, etc.

5) Does your tank run on air pumps? And has anyone sprayed insecticides (fly or roach sprays) nearby lately?

 

6) Can you show us what was used to mix the ca, mg, K? And what ratios of each?

1) I keep caridina shrimp. Pure red lines. Have 2 mystery snails, bunch of ramshorns snails and pond snail babies in the tank. Also have a small bristlenose catfish. 

2) I live in Sydney, inner west suburbs but I haven't been using tap water recently.

3) No lid, it's an open tank. It's next to the washing machine. One possibility is that specks of detergent powder could have made its way into the tank. 

4) I have Amazonia substrate, lava rocks, drift wood, stainless steel mesh with various kinds of moss tied down with cotton string. Have had this tank for about 2 years and have never experienced anything like this.

5) Tank runs on an aquaclear filter with ceramic noodles and a sponge filter driven with an airpump. 

6) I used an aquascaping spade/shovel to mix the solution with the ro water in a clean bucket. The mix I used was the one you suggested. 58g CaSO4: 37g MgSO4: 11 K2SO4.

I also should add that not every shrimp is acting this way. The adult shrimp seem to be fine, just the juveniles and sub adults seem to be losing their ability to swim properly. Some swim upside down/do loop de loops  ? eventually losing their colour and lying at the bottom sideways as if they are struggling to molt. 

Edited September 25, 2019 by kvinnyy

[sdlTBfanUK]

I can't see anything really likely to be a problem with the parameters, I kept caridinia at TDS 160-170 before and so I don't think that would be a problem.

I wouldn't think the location of the tank is very good, especially without a lid? As JayC indicates it does sound like a toxic poisoning and if you use washing powder some of the detergent dust could be floating around the room and getting into the tank, and the airline also could be carrying into the tank slightly contaminated air. 

Small young shrimp are A LOT more fragile than adults! I had PRL in a tank and that was using tap water, that didn't work for long and shrimp numbers fluctuated wildly. The parameters of the tap water were within caridina range. I now use RO plus mineraliser as you are doing.

Do you feed the babies any baby specific foods? I usually don't clean the glass inside back or sides as babies enjoy eating that biofilm?

Caridina shrimp stop breeding in winter naturally, I had that happen with mine, but I don't think it has anything to do with temperature as my tank has a heater and is pretty constant aside from the occasional hot spell.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IYvkSWrZAEc

Simon 

[kvinnyy]

33 minutes ago, sdlTBfanUK said:

I can't see anything really likely to be a problem with the parameters, I kept caridinia at TDS 160-170 before and so I don't think that would be a problem.

I wouldn't think the location of the tank is very good, especially without a lid? As JayC indicates it does sound like a toxic poisoning and if you use washing powder some of the detergent dust could be floating around the room and getting into the tank, and the airline also could be carrying into the tank slightly contaminated air. 

Small young shrimp are A LOT more fragile than adults! I had PRL in a tank and that was using tap water, that didn't work for long and shrimp numbers fluctuated wildly. The parameters of the tap water were within caridina range. I now use RO plus mineraliser as you are doing.

Do you feed the babies any baby specific foods? I usually don't clean the glass inside back or sides as babies enjoy eating that biofilm?

Caridina shrimp stop breeding in winter naturally, I had that happen with mine, but I don't think it has anything to do with temperature as my tank has a heater and is pretty constant aside from the occasional hot spell.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IYvkSWrZAEc

Simon 

Very interesting video... I didn't know that they slow down breeding during winter and that probably explains why I haven't seen any berried shrimp at all for a couple of months now. I've been trying to look for the saddle too and couldn't see any darkened areas on the carapace of my females. I thought it was because I wasn't feeding them enough.

I feed my shrimp snowflake foods, blanched vegetables, bee pollen and tried shrimp cuisine by Hikari. When I tried the shrimp cuisine, that was the point where I noticed a rise in tds from 150 rising up to almost 180. I only fed my shrimp like 5 pellets one time and my TDS kept rising and rising for the next couple of days. Shrimp were dying left and right. It was at the same time when I installed the heater and added an extra montmorillonite rock. It's hard to pinpoint what went wrong that started all these deaths but I started to question whether or not it was the shrimp cuisine because I had a look at the ingredients and it did say it contained copper. I stopped feeding them shrimp cuisine after finding out that.

It could also have been the sudden swing in temperature that caused the deaths. I'm really not sure anymore.

Edited September 25, 2019 by kvinnyy

[sdlTBfanUK]

Thats interesting about the hikari shrimp cuisine, I use that for the old cherry shrimps, but not the caridina? Best not to use it if your not sure though as there are sooooo many alternatives?

You may have been better just increasing the temperature over a longer period of time, but that would just be a guess! It makes life more complicated and difficult to pinpoint a problem when you do more than one adjustment/alteration at the same time.

I'm not familiar with the montmorillonite rock but won't that increase GH and/or TDS??? Did you put the rocks in at the same time as you started using the hikari shrimp cuisine? In the early days I tried calcium blocks which were sold as being good to help shrimp moult and the TDS skyrocketed within days!

Are the vegetables 'organic' - very important?

I don't think I have ever seen a saddle on a caridina as the shell isn't clear enough to see it? 

Simon

[kvinnyy]

 

19 minutes ago, sdlTBfanUK said:

Thats interesting about the hikari shrimp cuisine, I use that for the old cherry shrimps, but not the caridina? Best not to use it if your not sure though as there are sooooo many alternatives?

You may have been better just increasing the temperature over a longer period of time, but that would just be a guess! It makes life more complicated and difficult to pinpoint a problem when you do more than one adjustment/alteration at the same time.

I'm not familiar with the montmorillonite rock but won't that increase GH and/or TDS??? Did you put the rocks in at the same time as you started using the hikari shrimp cuisine? In the early days I tried calcium blocks which were sold as being good to help shrimp moult and the TDS skyrocketed within days!

Are the vegetables 'organic' - very important?

I don't think I have ever seen a saddle on a caridina as the shell isn't clear enough to see it? 

Simon

Montmorillonite for most part won't sky rocket your TDS but it does release magnesium and calcium over time. The clay also helps binds and traps toxic compounds apparently. It's suppose to be beneficial for shrimps. I have had one stone in there for a while and figured I should replace it because I read that it loses its effects over time and should be removed.

You can see the saddle sometimes through a transparent gap behind their head. It's grey in colour. 

And yes, I assume the vegetables I feed them are organic and I washed them in filtered water and boil them in filtered water and then rinse them in ro water before putting it in the tank.

Edited September 25, 2019 by kvinnyy

[sdlTBfanUK]

Not sure why you 'assume' (I guess this means you don't know) the spinach (or any other vegetables) are organic?? Mass produced are rarely organic and washing and cooking won't be sufficient if pesticides have been used or it was grown in a polluted environment?

Simon

[jayc]

Take the montmorillonite out for now. It's not helping,

it could be moulting issues, if not all shrimps are suffering the same.

This is the best lead we have so far, so let's take action to reduce TDS to around 140.

How long have you had these shrimp?

[kvinnyy]

33 minutes ago, jayc said:

Take the montmorillonite out for now. It's not helping,

it could be moulting issues, if not all shrimps are suffering the same.

This is the best lead we have so far, so let's take action to reduce TDS to around 140.

How long have you had these shrimp?

I will take the montmorillonite clay out for now. I've reduced the tds to 160 now just by diluting with ro water drip and will continue to do so. I don't want to drain water out as that will decrease my gH levels which I'm trying to increase. I'm also afraid to add anymore remineralised water with higher gH into the tank as that will further stress out the shrimp. I'm unsure if I increased the gH too rapidly and the shrimp are dying because of that. It was just 1dgh/12.5ppm across 1 week. 

I've had these shrimp for 1.5 years now and have never seen them react this way. I've used montmorillonite clay from the same package before but it didn't cause problems for me. Could raising temperature cause toxins to be released from older montmorillonite rock I had in the tank?

Edited September 26, 2019 by kvinnyy

[jayc]

15 hours ago, kvinnyy said:

Could raising temperature cause toxins to be released from older montmorillonite rock I had in the tank?

Not sure about releasing toxins from the rock. The temp difference from 16C to 22C isn't that big of a change that would do that sort of thing. But increasing temps and adding fresh water can trigger a moult. 

Keep going with the RO drip to bring TDS down to 140. When you get to 140, don't change the tank in any way for a week.

Report back here with your observations.