Caridina Rust disease treatment

[RS02]

This is a thread dedicated to my hopefully effective treatment to rust disease on some red calco bee shrimps. The shrimps are introduced 4 days ago to my planted tank, Parameters as follow:

20H tank

RO water with reminiralizer

Oase thermostyle 30 filter

CO2 1bpm on timer with light

Blue velvet shrimp x8

Red calco bee shrimp x6

Kuhli loach x6

PH: 6.8

KH: 2-4dkh

GH: 1-2dGH

NO3:0

NO2:0

Above results are from test strips, api test kit coming tomorrow and will report back on parameters.

Now a little history about the tank:

the tank was set up by dry starting for carpet plants, then flooding and adding CO2. tested the PH to be stable at 6.8 with test strip but KH and GH was at 0. Added crushed oyster shell to add some buffer ability to the water. added in blue valvets and all was well, one got stuck in the filter intake and was found too late, died after rescue. then added loaches and snails. 4 days ago finally decided to add some caridina shrimps as the tank seems stable. 

Water changes was sparse. 10-20% at most and only dripped. I didn't have a quarintine tank so the caridinas was dripped and let in the tank. I seem to recall seeing one of them that had a dark spot and thinking it was nothing major (didnt do enough research)

Today I decided to find that shrimp and found it resting on the underside of the driftwood and the pattern on the shell had black spots on it. it seems very dormant while the others are out and about. Contacted the shrimp seller and got the following suggestions:

GH too low;

KH too high;

Temp too high;

Increase oxygen level;

Do 25% water changes;

Treat with hydrogen peroxide;

Feed indian almond leaves;

Today I will do a 25% water change, have a temp controller coming tomorrow to lower temp to 24 degrees, and test parameters. As for the KH and GH booster they will arrive a bit later. I should treat it with hydrogen peroxide or as this form suggests Oregano oil. One issue is that I feed fluval shrimp granules and those are not wafers so I do not know the correct dosage for oregano oil.... and I dont know if the loaches will do well with H2O2 so I will probably do that as the final option.

If any of yall have inputs feel free to share, any help is appreciated. 

[RS02]

Forgot to add Photos lol

 

[jayc]

We definitely need better close up photos to confirm if your shrimp has rust disease.

 

[RS02]

This one definetly shows, its been sitting in roughly the same place without moving for a day now. However if i get anywhere close with a net itll jump away so catching it is probably out of the question.

[sdlTBfanUK]

I would definitely try and remove that shrimp asap. You can keep it in any container (ice cream tub) or even a bucket, you want to treat it separately (not the whole tank iif possible) and avoid it spreading. Catching shrimp can be an art, I find moving the net really slowly to them is less likely to spook them and then quickly catch them when the net is very very close to them - sometimes they will even climb on/in the net using this method! Even if the sick one does die it is better to protect the others in the tank overall.

It's likely the shrimp had this when you bought it, but hopfully the others are ok, just keep a close eye on them for now? The water parameters are all out of sink and you should work on those but I doubt it caused' this shrimp to get sick. 

[RS02]

Update

Seems the one with the black spots are active again, saw it munching on some food today. did a water change yesterday and tested with api kit today(KH GH kit is still on the way):

ph 6.8-7.0 (need a better CRI light)

Nitrate: 0;

Nitrite: 0;

Ammonia: 0;

My indian almond leaves arrived as well as the oregano oil(80%). I'll put in a leaf tomorrow when the light is on. But how do yall suggest I soak the shrimp food since its granule instead of wafers? By weight? I do have some kelp wafers but those seems to not attract shrimp but snails. and the loaches will eat the shrimp granules too.

Heater control is installed and temp should be gradually falling down to 23 now.

On another note, two other bee shrimps are idle today with the shell turning opaque instead of nearly transparent. I assume this is because they are trying to molt? their organs seems normal (not pink) and there's quite a few molts around the tank. 

 

 

[sdlTBfanUK]

The indian almond leaf may float for a day but will sink later!

Could you buy some algae wafers, just a small pack, off internet if you don't want to go out, they won't go to waste as shrimp/snails will eat them, and they are cheap to buy? It will also be handy to have some stored in case you need them in the future for treatment.

May also be worth buying a TDS meter as once everything is up to speed. most people will generally use that and only occasionallly check other parameters, so is much easier/quicker to use and also cheap!

I imagine those shrimp are moulting, as you stated.

[RS02]

Update

Indian amond leaf sunk and saw a coupe shrimps nibble at it for a while, should be more appealing a couple days later when it starts decomposing. 

Bought some hikari algae wafers, soaked in 0.05:4.5ml oregano solution ( the extract is oil and shaking it only creates a emulsion instead of mixing so donno how percise that is) fed to the tank. Some healthy shrimps took a couple bites while the sick one prefered to graze on the driftwood. Loaches also seems interested.

Tested GH KH with api and got the following:

5dGH

4dKH

Guess I should remove some of the crushed oyster shell I had in the filter. And also a water change probably tomorrow (I didnt do a full 25% only changed 1.25 gallon)

 

[sdlTBfanUK]

Lets hope it all works out and the sick shrimp finds the medicated algae wafer. At least you can use bits of the wafers as food for the loaches.

I agree that you should drop the KH if you can as the calceo bee shrimp prefer it as low as possible, though it is probably ok for the blue neocaridina shrimp, but even then you don't want it any higher.

Indian almond leaves will take weeks, or even months to completely decompose but they will be doing good things for the tank all that time.

Good picture of the kuhlie loach and calceo shrimp. What size aquarium is it and how many of each creature do you have? The ground cover plants look great also.

[RS02]

3 hours ago, sdlTBfanUK said:

Lets hope it all works out and the sick shrimp finds the medicated algae wafer. At least you can use bits of the wafers as food for the loaches.

I agree that you should drop the KH if you can as the calceo bee shrimp prefer it as low as possible, though it is probably ok for the blue neocaridina shrimp, but even then you don't want it any higher.

Indian almond leaves will take weeks, or even months to completely decompose but they will be doing good things for the tank all that time.

Good picture of the kuhlie loach and calceo shrimp. What size aquarium is it and how many of each creature do you have? The ground cover plants look great also.

20H with 6 loaches , 6 bee and 7 blue velvet. only death so far was the 8th velvet got stuck in the filter intake and died shortly after its freed.