Cherry Shrimp Dying

[sdlTBfanUK]

I've not seen that one before but Australia is a long way away and so large you probably have a lot of 'stuff' we don't get? It looks and sounds good so I would give it a go as it says for shrimps!

Simon

Edited September 12, 2020 by sdlTBfanUK

[jayc]

$28 _+ $8.95 for 100ml !!

Make your own remineraliser.

 

[WaldoDude]

Ok yea definitely giving that a go ? 
thanks!

[WaldoDude]

Went to the lfs today to pick up some fish and I came across this product called "Carbonate Hardness Generator", I told the lfs about my issue with adding KH causing the pH to increase significantly. They told me this will add KH and shouldn't cause such a big jump in pH. It was only $12 so I thought I'd give it go. Just tried it and again same results. I added enough to get a KH of 2 and again the pH went from ~6.2 to an 8 ? sigh haha

On the hand, cherry shrimp are doing ok so far but its only been a week. the 3 week mark will be the real indication i think.

 

Edited September 1, 2020 by WaldoDude

[sdlTBfanUK]

I think the 2 parameters are linked so there probably isn't anything that won't affect both?

I'm pleased to hear that you haven't lost any shrimps so you are well on the way to being sorted hopefully!

Simon

[WaldoDude]

Thanks! Yea I get that but then my question is how does everyone else maintain a good kh and a reasonable pH? i.e. its recommended cherry shrimp ideally should be in a pH ~7.4 and KH of atleast 3, so how do I achieve that? ?

[jayc]

28 minutes ago, WaldoDude said:

pH ~7.4

Aim for pH, and don't worry too much about what the KH is.

If it takes KH of 1 to get your tank to pH 7.4, then that is what KH should be.

Edited September 1, 2020 by jayc

[sdlTBfanUK]

The only way I can answer that is to use the proper shrimp GH/KH+ with RO water. If your balance is out and you start using the proper RO and GH/KH+ it will very slowly adjust to where it (all paraeters) should be. It would obviously happen quicker if you do a huge or complete water change but that can cause a new set of problems, and as your shrimps seem to have settled down the slower change will be safer I think!

Smon

[beanbag]

21 hours ago, sdlTBfanUK said:

The only way I can answer that is to use the proper shrimp GH/KH+ with RO water.

 

I agree with this person

[Crabby]

I just go with my tap water, and add stuff to get the pH where I want it. I don't chase GH and KH, they just come with the pH. If your water is hard, add some leaves or driftwood. If your water is soft, add some crushed coral in a form where it can be removed. Easy as.

[WaldoDude]

Unfortunately I have found 2 dead shrimps today. ?  Looked just like the others, with one looking like it was mid-molt. Others seemed to have molted successfully.
Parameters:
pH: ~7.8
Am: 0 
No2: 0
No3: 0
Gh: 7
Kh: 3
TDS: 178
Temp: 23C

 I did a ~15 water change.

[jayc]

4 hours ago, WaldoDude said:

Parameters:
pH: ~7.8

Only a little bit lower to go to get to the 7.4 target.

[sdlTBfanUK]

Those figures aren't too bad, hopefully the water change may have brought the PH down as that has crept up!

If these are the only 2 of the 12 recent purchases then there could be down to them not being able to cope with all the moving around, especially if you got the from a LFS. They probably went from breeders tank, to shop tank, to your tank in a short time and all with different water parameters. To lose one of 6 would be normal for me from when I bought them at LFS so try not to over react at this point! If some moulted ok then maybe the shrimp that died weren't quite as healthy/strong? Buying from a specialist will be 1 less step/water and they were probably kept in water better suited to them.

Let us know if you still get any deaths though, after 3-4 weeks the shrimp should have moulted once and be well adjusted to their new water parameters so you shouldn't see any problems from then on???

Simon

[WaldoDude]

Yeah hopefully! As I mentioned earlier, the pH has gone back up to 8 ever since I started adding KH to the ro water. Even at <1 KH, the pH would go up to 8 as soon as I add kh ?.  As of last week's water change I stopped adding KH and probably hence why the pH of the tank is starting to go back down again, the kH of the tank overall hasn't changed yet as it still sitting at ~3. I got my hands on some food-grade calcium carbonate so i'm gonna give that a go.

[sdlTBfanUK]

Go VERY carefully adding the calcium carbonate, check it in some seperate water before using it in the tank. I added calcium blocks once and the TDS rocketed?

Simon

[WaldoDude]

Will do! I'm going with adding 1g increments

[WaldoDude]

Hello all its been a while! 

In the roughly 2 months since I last posted, I don't think things have improved that much. Out of the 12 cherries and 2 australian amanos I added as my 2nd batch almost 3 and 1/2 months ago, I think I only have 4 cherries and 1 australian amano left. Since I last posted the tank has gone a through a few experiences during this period and ill try to talk through em, in case its related to the missing/dead shrimp. Like my first batch of shrimp, everything thing seemed fine for the 1st month or 2 (apart from the 2 cherries dying at 3 weeks in, which I attributed to acclimating issues) but then very slowly I'd fine a dead shrimp over time, weeks apart. Unlike like my first batch earlier in this thread where deaths started out gradually until i started seeing shrimp die every couple of days (or perhaps it hasn't reach this latter stage yet).
Anyways, I've found 3 dead shrimp (apart from the first 2) weeks apart, another 1 I found outside the tank on the floor and more recently, a few days ago one of my australian amanos went for walk, out of the tank, all the way to my sisters room and got cooked by the window in the hot sun (a distance of more than 12 metres!). I've heard that those amanos are known to crawl out of the tank although I've read this was usually during the first 72 hours of introducing them. Regardless, I know I've lost at least 6 cherries which should leave with 6 in the tank, however I've only seen and counted the same 4 shrimp with the other 2 possible dead as since I removed the seiryu stones, I can see most of the tank quite well but who knows they could be hiding very well. 

Now during all this I've started having issues with algae in the tank. This started ever since I removed the seiryu stones, after which I noticed the tank glass would get a build up of green algae quite quickly after I did a clean (like 2-3 days). So in an effort to combat this, I reduced the lighting hours from 9 hours down to 6. This to my surprised has seemed to make it worse, like alot worse. The algae was still appearing on the glass quite quickly but now even thicker. It looked like a wall of green hair algae growing on all 4 sides of the aquarium, at this point it didn't seem like it was growing on the plants in the tank. I decided to reduce my feedings of the CPDs and shrimp from once a day to once every 3-4 days but again it didnt seem to make a difference. Last week during the clean I decided to leave the back wall covered with the algae as I thought it looked cool and gave the shrimp a big grazing area and I don't know if what happened next was because of this decision or if it was going to happen regardless, in the last few days all the plants are now covered in the algae!  

At the same time, in the last few days I've lost 1 cpd and I've found one today that looks like its struggling to swim (constantly swimming upwards but sinking). The first one I found motionless at the bottom of the tank but when I scooped it up it was still alive, kept it in a small cup floating in the breeder tank but it eventually died. I noticed that when it did, a white growth seemed to have kind of burst out from inside its head and mouth area... As for the one thats struggling today, all I can see odd is that its abdomen area seems kind of see through in the light and a little caved in but im not sure... My initial thoughts are perhaps that it is starving and that Im not feeding them enough since I reduced my feeding frequency? Maybe this is the issue with the shrimp too? but if so I would've expected the CPD fry that are also in the tank to have been affected first but they all seem fine.

Water parameters seem fine although I expected a spike in nitrates due to the algae bloom but no, No3 is around 10ppm or lower (looks like <5 looking at the tube head on but much darker and closer to 10 when looking bottom up through the tube). 

Also with regards to my struggle to reduce the ph of the tank, during this whole period I've been using RO water with Salty Shrimp GH+ and the ph has never dropped. Its still around 8.2/8.4. Interestingly, my other 15 gallon tank for which I use the same RO water and same GH+ the ph is around 7.4/7.6 ? 

I'm not sure if I should have started a new thread since this has now expanded to include a whole range of issues or what not. 
Here is the water parameters as of today:
Am - 0
NO2 - 0
N03 - ~10 (maybe <5)
Ph - 8.2/8.4
Gh - 7
Kh - 2/3
TDS - 147
Temp - 24C (With spring and summer the temp has been increasing from 23 to 25 during the day, I dont have the heater running anymore)

I am thinking of rescaping the tank but before that maybe someone might be able to point out something I'm missing or doing wrong ? 

Cheers,
Waldo

[sdlTBfanUK]

With so few shrimp, they shouldn't need much/any extra food above the biofilm, but the fish will need sufficient so maybe revert back to a little fish food each day for them!

It still sounds like the shrimp are having molting issues based on the time spacing etc.

Your best bet probably is to restart the tank with everything right from the start! If you can now get GH/KH+ then get that as well, as it will be worth it to make it easier for you. Use RO water plus mineraliser, no CO2 or fertilizers, no rock etc, (plants should be ok to re-use) etc, based on what has been posted on this thread? Keep a thorough record of Everything and when, especially as you still have a PH problem that we haven't got to the bottom of yet with this current setup!

The 2 things I noticed with algae is that it 'blooms' more with natural light and fish waste, if either/both of these have increased that may be your cause? It is summer now where you are? I quite like the algae on the back look of your photo?

Simon

[WaldoDude]

So I think the gradual death of shrimp has subsided. I havent lost any for atleast a month now. During the water change today I was even surprised to have found a shrimplet.
Tank wise not much has changed since my last post. Ph is still high, and I have yet to restart the tank. Algae bloom still in full force.

Sorry for the late response @sdlTBfanUK but yes it is summer here! I've just added some otocinclus' to help with the algae and although I too like the algae at the back, I might remove it the next time I clean it as I've heard its best to remove as much as possible as it could be releasing spores and therefore undoing any manual removal I've done. Of course I'll make an update once I've restarted the tank.

[WaldoDude]

So more good news, theres been an explosion in the shrimplet population in the tank! ? So upon seeing this I thought, I'd test the water to see if anything's changed and what do you know, the ph is sitting around ~7.4. Thats the lowest I've gotten it down to! So I thought I'd share what I did to get to this point.

As you know, I was struggling to lower my tanks ph, even after swiching to remineralised RO/DI water. Moreover I was using Salty Shrimp GH+ and had to KH myself but found that doing so increased my waters ph quite high. 

 So more good news, theres been an explosion in the shrimplet population in the tank! ? So upon seeing this I thought, I'd test the water to see if anything's changed and what do you know, the ph is sitting around ~7.4. Thats the lowest I've gotten it down to! So I thought I'd share what I did to get to this point.

As you know, I was struggling to lower my tanks ph, even after swiching to remineralised RO/DI water. Moreover I was using Salty Shrimp GH+ and had to add KH myself but found that doing so increased my waters ph quite high. Well, as per my last post, I ended up continuing to remineralise my ro water with SS GH+ and use that without ever adding KH. One thing I noticed was that even though I wasnt adding KH, I was still testing a kh of 2-3 in the tank for quite a while. Now someone in another forum then suggested that KH from having the seiryu stones prior in addition to the KH I was adding initially  had been soaked up by the substrate and was leaking it back into the water column and thus continuing the buffer the ph. He suggested I therefore continue my water changes and eventually the KH should go down. That was a month ago, after another weekly water change yesterday and seeing the multitudes of shrimplets, today I also tested the KH in addition to the ph, and got a reading of 1-2 degrees, so it is indeed slowly going down. Im sure as a result the ph has also gone down.

Of course once the kh gets <1 I am going to have to actually add KH to the tank and perhaps finally get my hands on the SS GH+ AND KH+

 

[sdlTBfanUK]

Great to here it is now working and you have some shrimplets! What you say regarding the stone makes sense to me!

It would be easier and more stable to get GH/KH+ if you can, as the proportion will be set?

Simon