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SonoranStorm

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Hi all.
So some background
My 10g tank has:
Blue Dreams
Amanos
1 Cardinia that stowed away in a plant shipment I got
3 Rainbow Paskais
1 Celestial Danio
Phoenix Moss
Crinum Calamistratum (Onion Plant)
Nymphaea Zenkeri (Tiger Lotus)

Bolbitis Heudelotii (Creeping Fern)

Eleocharis sp. Mini (Mini Dwarf Hairgrass )
Micranthemum (Monte Carlo)

A random piece of Subwasstertang
algea but i dont want that

The overall goal of this tank is to be a shrimp tank with the neos and maybe a species of Caridina once I'm a little more experienced. But I have a hard time keeping the neos alive a friend who owns the LFS ive been buying them at recommended i try buying from a local shrimper because his shrimp might be more well suited to the local water than the shrimp he buys from abroad because he thinks its weird that im having a tough time with Neos. So I did just that when i met up with him he told me co2 might be the issue since it makes the water acidic and makes molting hard and it makes the water parameters more unstable so I stopped using Co2 for the time being and the shrimp look healthy. But the issue is I would like to keep using Co2 for the benefits to the plants and because id like to keep the carpet ive been working on.

Current Parameters

Temp: 74.5 F/ 23.6 C

Ph: Between 6 and 6.4 (im bad at colors) but its yellow (API Test)

Kh: 4 drops the chat says 4 degrees 71 PPM

Gh: 6 drops the chart says 6 degrees 107 PPM

TDS: Waiting on a meter from amazon.

Lights are on between 4 PM and 9:30 PM for those who don't do the military time. Bellow are the spectral percentages of light if this helps anyone.

Any advice on how and if I should add Co2?

1uitvyznvp351.jpg

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Hey, welcome to the forum! Here's what I noticed:

pH is possibly a bit low. I won't go as far to say that's why you're losing shrimp, but it is low for neos. I would do neos between 6.6 and 7.4.

Temp, GH and KH look good to me.

I personally don't see a need for CO2 or ferts. They can both impact shrimp negatively. Plants will all grow fine without those. CO2 and ferts just act as a bit of a steroid for plants. 

If it's working now, keep it the same. That's my advice. If you have saddled girls, and moults, then leave it as is.

-Crabby

 

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What is the parameters of your source water (ie. the water you use for water changes) ?

Because KH of 4 does not lend itself to a low pH value of 6-6.4. 

Your pH is indeed too low for Neocaridina, as Crabby said. I assume this value is without the CO2, and you measured it after a few days to let it gas off. If not, measure pH again after CO2 has been turned off for a day at least.

KH of 4 is fine for Neos. So we might not have to change anything if it was just a measurement error.

 

Also, what is your fertilising regime like? Do you add ferts once a week? Do you dump it in all in one go?

The sudden change in water parameters when you pour ferts into the tank is not good for shrimps.

We can make ferts work with Neos by dosing the same amount used a week but splitting that amount out each day. A little each day rather than a whole lot once a week.

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I use a nilocg fertelizer once a week after water changes but i only add one of 5 doses. So i guess ill stop the ferts and maybe just add excel? 
 

also after jayC mentioned the ph didnt seem right  rerinsed the tubes and ran it again my ph is indeed much higher than i thought. 
 

i may need to find the high range ph test 

https://imgur.com/uu4Vw0p

 

Edited by SonoranStorm
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2 hours ago, SonoranStorm said:

my ph is indeed much higher than i thought. 
 

i may need to find the high range ph test 

https://imgur.com/uu4Vw0p

That's much better. That light blue would indicate maybe a 7.2 - 7.4 pH

TDS is the only other parameter we would like to see. Hopefully your TDS meter arrives soon.

 

Your water parameters look ok so far minus the TDS

 

As you said, stop the fertilisers for a while and lets see how the shrimp respond to that change. I would avoid Excel as well. Excel is made from Glutaraldehyde (or Glut for short). Do a search on Glutaraldehyde to see what it is and what it is used for. It is a disinfectant that kills all microorganisms, the beneficial bacteria in your tank included. Then consider if you should be putting this in your tank. 

 

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I called my water company they said last they checked the Ph in the local water is 8.0. 
 

Will update with the TDS Thursday when the meter arrives. ?

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52 minutes ago, jayc said:

Where are you from?

Los Angeles 

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Nilocg fertilizer temporarily makes the water acidic.  Try the pH test before and after a dose to see for yourself.

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Welcome to the forum, hope you enjoy it and find it useful?

Lots of info in your post.............

The shrimp from a LFS are probably kept at the store in water that is unlikely to be the right parameters as it will probably be part of one system in the store, unless they are in the store in an individual tank seperated from the others?

I would avoid C02 and ferterlizers if you can, neither have any positives with shrimps but are well known to cause problems with shrimp keeping. The less chemicals used the better unless they are meant specifically for shrimp! Hopefully the plants will survive still without the ferts or C02 but will just grow a bit slower, and that actually means less maintenance! It is important to keep the parameters as stable as possible without any fluctuations!

Did you acclimate the shrimps with a dripper over many hours, if not that is likely why the shrimp died. Neocaridina are very adaptable to a wide range of parameters but they need to be acclimated very slowly!

The only other caution would be keeping Amano shrimps with Neocaridina/Caradina. You may be fine if you only have 1 or 2 Amano, but they will be competing with the smaller shrimps and obviously the Amanos will win. The Amano are great in a tank with fish, even fairly large fish but I wouldn't keep them with dwarf shrimp. I know we had someone on here keeping cherry shrimps with a couple of Amano in a smallish tank, and once the Amano were seperated it made a huge difference to the cherry shrimp, they were much happier!

Simon

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I have about 2-3 amanos in the tank i hope they dont become a bigger issue. I mainly got them because i has having an issue with GHA. 
 

Also i did not. I didnt know they needed to be drip aclimated for hours. I did about 40 minutes when i got the shrimp from the vendor selling out of his come the container was cracked so i just floated it a bit and released them and they seem to be doing well i had a small die off but i assumed it was also because of the transport stress and all. 

Edited by SonoranStorm
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Not drip acclimating is a very common newbie error, did it myself a few times when I started with shrimps! For better survival rates, short AND long term you need to drip acclimate them over a number of hours.

Simon

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Update: tds in water is 306 ppm

i got a high range ph test the pH is likely 7.2-7.4 as it does not seem to exceed 7.4 

 

596DEA05-A87A-4C6B-8B59-E7DEC4A168B8.jpeg

B8FB13F0-DD54-4763-A6CA-BBBD100FB743.jpeg

19 hours ago, sdlTBfanUK said:

Not drip acclimating is a very common newbie error, did it myself a few times when I started with shrimps! For better survival rates, short AND long term you need to drip acclimate them over a number of hours.

Simon

Ill make sure any new shrimp going forward are drip aclimates for hours ?

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4 hours ago, SonoranStorm said:

Update: tds in water is 306 ppm

Gotta try getting that down towards 200.

Do you use tap water for water changes? 

What TDS do you get from your source water? 

 

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The TDS 

52 minutes ago, jayc said:

Gotta try getting that down towards 200.

Do you use tap water for water changes? 

What TDS do you get from your source water? 

 

The tds from the tap is 180 max from different faucets around the house. Should i do more WCs? Someone on facebook said i could add carbon to my filter. I have some from when i treated the tank for Hydra. 

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As with JayC, the TDS is a bit high. Test your source water to see what the TDS of that is?

Shrimp don't have much of a nio load but having the fish in the tank will probably cause the TDS to rise quicker than just shrimps.

The easiest/quickest/cheapest route for you, being USA would be to get a zerowater filter jug. They are readily available in US at places like walmart. It produces RO equivalent water from your tap water, ie TDS 000!

https://www.zerowater.com/

If everything is settled and ging well (ie shrimp have stopped dying) I would just do 10% water change every week, ie remove 1L of TDS 300 and add 1L of TDS 000. The first change should take the TDS to 270, second week remove 1L TDS 270 and add 1L 000 TDS 243 etc etc.

https://zoomed.com/the-little-dripper-and-big-dripper/

Once you get the water to around 200+ you can then regulate the TDS by using some tap water and some zerowater if you want to carry on that way OR you can use 100% zerowater and add GH/KH+. If you plan to get caridina shrimp though you will need to use 100% zerowater with GH+. Either though can be achieved using the above method as it is slowly adjusting over time but you may need to get the TDS to about 150 for caridina and PH below 7. IF you get the dripper, use that to add the new water slowly.

Simon

edit - we cross posted. You would have to do some large water changes to get the TDS down just using tap water, thats a bit risky (but quickest) so I wouldn't go that route myself, but it is possible, ie a large 50% change should get you to TDS 240 if you use water from the tap (dechlorinated but not filtered) added by dripper. I would still do what I previously recommended.

There may be something like rock which is also raising the TDS???

Maybe when you get to where you want to be you should plan to do 20% water change per week - as you have fish, otherwise I DO 10% with just shrimp!

Edited by sdlTBfanUK
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1 hour ago, SonoranStorm said:

The tds from the tap is 180 max from different faucets around the house. Should i do more WCs?

Wow, that high for water straight out of the tap.

By comparison, my tap water is ~80 TDS.

Yes, you should do more water changes, but with tap water at about 180TDS, the best you can do is to get it nearer 200. Which is close to what the Neo shrimps like.

Simon has given you a solution using 'Zerowater filters', but you could also try rainwater. Collect as much as you can and use that for water changes. Or you can get an RO unit.

The cheap solution is rainwater.

 

You can get to around 200 with tapwater but it will take a while. If you do regular 10% changes, than increasing it to 20% water changes as Simon advised will help you get to a lower TDS faster. i wouldn't do more than 20% weekly changes.

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I forgot about rainwater. There is also bottled water as another option but thats a lot more expensive and a hassle to keep getting it!

Its been a while since I have been to LA but depending on where exactly there you are of coarse, there used to be a lot of polution which may get picked up by rain water (Shrimp are VERY sensitive to pollution) and from my time spent out there (albeit a decade ago and in the OC not much time spent in LA) they didn't get much rain anyway (in fact it was so rare it used to be feature on the news and usually there were soooo many car crashes as drivers weren't used to driving on wet roads), assuming also that you have easy outside access to collect it? In the OC I remember it used to evaporate almost instantly (every house had irrigated gardens and even the roadside verges were irrigated otherwise nothing would grow-fond memories aplenty of time out there), though if you can get it to work somehow you may also get mosquito larvae and the fish will LOVE those as a treat.

Simon

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8 hours ago, jayc said:

Wow, that high for water straight out of the tap.

By comparison, my tap water is ~80 TDS.

Yes, you should do more water changes, but with tap water at about 180TDS, the best you can do is to get it nearer 200. Which is close to what the Neo shrimps like.

Simon has given you a solution using 'Zerowater filters', but you could also try rainwater. Collect as much as you can and use that for water changes. Or you can get an RO unit.

The cheap solution is rainwater.

 

You can get to around 200 with tapwater but it will take a while. If you do regular 10% changes, than increasing it to 20% water changes as Simon advised will help you get to a lower TDS faster. i wouldn't do more than 20% weekly changes.

When i called the lady at the  Water and Power Co. She said our water comes from limestone aquifers and reservoirs so PH and TDS was high. 
But im going to take advice from sdlTBfanUK and use the filter jug. 

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Update: added a gallon of distilled water tds is now 277

Should i do a weekly change with 0tds water?

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Maybe not so drastic.

Mix your distilled water with a bit of tap water to get 100 TDS for weekly 10-20 % water changes.

Once you hit your target TDS, go back to 10% weekly water changes.

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5 hours ago, SonoranStorm said:

Update: added a gallon of distilled water tds is now 277

Should i do a weekly change with 0tds water?

I would as long as you add the 000 TDS water over several hours (ideally drip it in). The next 1 gallon change with TDS 000 water should take you from 277 to around 250, the next week should go from 250 to 225 and the next go from 225 to 200 so you will be there in a month.

JayC recommended is more cautious but would take a lot longer (would definitely do that if you were keeping caridina shrimp) but as you have cherry shrimp I think they will be fine with 1 gallon 000 TDS water each week. The above figures are based on the current TDS staying stable but they will probably rise through the week as you have fish and if there is evaporation. Basically, when you are going to do the water change read the TDS and you know you are changing 1/10 of the water to 000 TDS so after the water change will be a reduction of 10% from the before TDS!

Once you are at the  TDS 200(ish) figure you are looking for, you can decide on what you will do as a regular maintenance routine. In order to know what happens in the weeks it would be a good idea just to write down the figures and dates of the TDS, before and after water changes as you will know then what happens in a week for evaporation/fish etc. If you are getting enough evaporation that you need to top up in between water changes/maintenance, you should top up with TDS 000 always. Your current high TDS in the tank will most likely have happened due to topping up with the tap water (plus the fish) and that will increase the TDS each time you top up??? Evaporation is pure water (TDS 0) so the TDS are left in the water.

Simon

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Another question I was having. 
Cholla wood and stuff like  montmorillonite clay/ Mineral balls, or almond leaves? Is any of this stuff helpful? Should i consider it? Does it alter the water chem to a point where its more of hassle than its worth? 

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Also i have a small protein skimmer i got as a gift from my LFS during a raffle. Would that help with aeration? (also wondering if it would act as filtration since it has a sponge :P) 

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