What substrate do you use in your Neocaridina heteropoda tank(s)?

[khemo]

I know a lot of us here use Benebachi for our bee shrimp tanks but what about cherrys?

I'm looking to add substrate to my cherry tanks (bare bottoms) but not sure what to use. I've got some spare Benebachi and eco-complete so was thinking about using one of them. I read that eco-complete can raise both the Ph and GH of the water though.......

What do you guys reckon? Would like to hear what everybody else is using.

cheers

.

[BlueBolts]

I have a fluval edge setup for cherries ... wanted a white/sand type substrate, and decided to use pool filter sand, which has worked out great. PH seems to be stable @ 7. ONLY regret is that the shrimp don't show the colour as well as a dark substrate.

[Kaizen088]

Up Aqua Shrimp Soil.

Shrimp show good colour and seem to be happy.

Cherries constantly moulting and berried.

[mickeyG]

Kaizen do you use mineral additives with the shrimp sand?

[Kaizen088]

No, I believe it has some in the substrate.

I do water changes with a mix of tap and rain water.

Their tank is part of a 4 tank sumped system that also houses breeding bristlenose so I've tried to find a happy medium for both. The other 3 bristlenose breeding tanks in the system have either bare bottoms or inert gravel.

[khemo]

I've heard good things about Up Aqua Shrimp Sand. A few people have mentioned that they use it to me a couple of times when I was buying shrimp off them. I might be getting some soon so will give it a trial run and see for myself.

[Gbang]

Khemo, I personally would not Reccomend any type of shrimp soil. Sounds crazy right? Here are my reasons

Neocaridina prefer a ph of 7 and GH of 8 and up. Shrimp sand buffers water to ph 6.5 and GH 4. Yes cherries will not have a problem but I have found that they do not reproduce as much. I have an alternative method with great success

Inert substrate + tap water mixed with Sulawesi to a TDS of 150 plus or ec of 275 plus. That's it :) works for me!

[fish4fish3]

1 out of 5 cherry tanks has substarte. And that's inert... black silica.

the other 4 are bare bottom.

works for me. lol

[mickeyG]

Hey guys would things like white rock/ Texas holey or a shellgrit/calgrit help in a cherry tank?

[izzy]

I use white silica sand that i got from a LFS. I have had no issues using this with tap water. So far so good.

[fish4fish3]

MickeyG... Probably would raise the PH too high if used as a substrate. i do have some coral chunks in my filter but check my PH regulaurly to make sure I don't go over board. My tap water is 8.0 and stays in that range... have no complaints yet.

[mickeyG]

F4f3 I thought it may be to high for cherries but thought I might ask as I have shrimp sand and instead of setting up a new tank thought some nice Texas rock would help make home for the cherries a lil more inviting but also being the wp up to where they prefer. I do have bags of moon sand sitting around but I'm a lil lazy and the idea of pulling my tank down makes me cringing haha

Thanks again F4F3

[Gbang]

you would be amazed how high cherries can tolerate. i believe the best wp for cherries is 7-8 with a gh of 10!!!

[OzShrimp]

i used to use black diamond quartz gravel for my cherries :)

[Neo-shrimp]

Inert gravel of any colour will be sufficient for Cherry shrimps..Any queries just ask DeanBOSSAQUARIA. A very successful breeder of Cherries. ::

[jrc693]

i have cherries in my grow tank full of eco complete, started with 3 that took a ride on a plant somone sent me, and now theres easily 60 - 70

[KiwiBigD]

For my Cherries I use a substrate, Caribsea range. Its a combination of beach sand/gravel with some calcium and I find the Ph naturally

sits between 7.4 and 7.8. If I wish to lower it Ph then I've added a bit of ADA and that brings it back nicely to around the 7.0 mark. Additionally they

have some good grey/black in both a larger and smaller size. I'm using that in all of my Cherry shrimp tanks, all 10 of them and found it really good.

Just don't add plants, they really don't do well with the higher Ph.