Here we go again, again!

[sdlTBfanUK]

Summary from the old thread;

I managed to destroy my wonderful Taiwan bee tank with a faulty heater that cooked them. I then set up the tank afresh May 2019 using shrimpking substrate, new plants and wood etc. The tank looked very drab from the start and several batches of new taiwan bee were added and died out instantly. Covid came along so I decided I would give up with the taiwan bee shrimp and get some fish instead about a year later (1 kilie and 12 mosquito rasbora). September 2020 I tried another batch of tawian bee but they fared no better and the tank was still very drab looking (and still is to this very day). I very much doubt it is the substrate but won't be using that again but have aquired a large bag of the old type of substrate I used before, but I really don't know what caused the problem, maybe there was some sort of bacterial infection or I accidently poisoned the shrimp, or there was something on the new plants/wood??? The parameters were always perfect and I have to just accept I will never know? At some later date I dumped some wild type red cherry culls into the tank as food for the killie but he didn't seem to eat them (they were clear/brown so maybe he didn't see them) and they seemed to settle into the tank and bred!

Fast forward to a month ago and I decided that now the postal service is better than it had been early in the pandemic, I should maybe try some more taiwan bee as the cherry shrimp had been in there for a year or so and doing well, so I assume whatever the problem was had gone, although the tank is still not as healthy looking as the other tanks using the other substrate! I ordered 15 black shrimps 2 weeks ago and put those in the tank and they seemed to be surviving so earlier this week I order 20 red/blue shrimp and put those in the ttank yesterday. This morning I counted 18 shrimps (about half) so it looks as though it maybe going to work now, the tank is so densely planted that I would never expect to see ALL the live shrimp anyway! The killie fish died a few days ago so he isn't a threat anymore and I doubt the rasboras are either. I am now in the process of fishing out the wild type cherry shrimp as/when I see them!

Here is the link to the full thread about the above but I decided to start a fresh thread from here on,

https://skfaquatics.com/forum/forums/topic/14523-here-we-go-again/

I will keep this thread updated and get some photos at some stage, though the new shrimp are a bit small at the moment.

 Simon

[sdlTBfanUK]

There isn't much to report on this at the moment, I am 50/50 as to whether this is going to work or not long term. I have seen 2 dead shrimp since adding the new ones and counted about half of the new shrimp bought, that I saw yesterday! This is going to be a long term experiment I guess, the best I hope will happen at this point is that the remaining shrimp survive and reproduce and that new borns born in the tank should be more suited to the environment/water etc.

There is an element of the acclimating didn't go as well/to plan as it should with my knowledge/experience, but I did the best I could, so that is what it is!

Simon

[beanbag]

Hello again, 

Just stopped by to wish you good luck, but if not, may as well break down the tank and start over completely.

I hope someday I can have a mixed tank as nice as yours.  So far, most of my shrimp babies have been low grade blue bolts.

[sdlTBfanUK]

You are of course right that the tank should be started afresh and if none of this batch survive I won't try any more until I can do a fresh start! I do have the substrate ready to do this but now isn't the time to do it, though I wonder whether it ever will be.........

I am pleased to hear you are getting babies, even if they are lower grade, you are heading in the right direction. Blue bolts are  probably my favourites of the taiwan bees.

Simon

Edited November 9, 2021 by sdlTBfanUK

[sdlTBfanUK]

I thought I should do an update on this. There are a few shrimps still alive in the tank but in all honesty this has not worked out as I hoped, obviously! I will just continue with the fish in this tank plus the odd surviving shrimps of neocaridina and caridina. I do have the new substrate to start a new tank but that is a bit unlikely, unless I move house at some point where it would make more sense to start afresh! 

Anyway, at this point I won't bother continuing with this thread, unless some miracle happens................

Simon

[sdlTBfanUK]

My TDS meter stopped working so I have thrown that away. I had another in my drawer so tried that and it looked like it was inaccurate reading 219 in the taiwan bee shrrimp water so I discarded that as well and ordered a new one which has arrived. I tried the new one and got a reading of 222 in that tank. When I did the usual weekly maintenance and partial change of water I made the usual RO (2 litres) which read TDS 000, and added 2 drops of GH+ and got a reading of 19 which seems to indicate the new meter is correct and accurate!

If you are wondering why I am posting this, it is quite likely the old TDS meter was incorrect and therefore I am wondering if that is why the shrimp didn't survive as it was reading 140 but actually nearer 220? It also means the spare meter I had was probably correct but was thrown out, d'oh!

I may try another batch of shrimp in the future, though a move is likely to happen in the near future so I may wait until that has happened! In the mean time I will try and double check this new tds meter is actually accurate, but it looks likely it is and, it was not a cheapie??