Hello from Hudson Falls, NY

[uny2bld]

Hello,

I am glad to have found your forum. I will be starting up my first

Dwarf Shrimp tank in a few days so any advice would be greatly appreciated. I

currently keep several marine species of crustaceans but no freshwater so this

will be a first for me. The tank I'm using is a 34 gallon Solana with a metal

halide pendant light fixture.

-Byron D.

[Squiggle]

Hey Byron, welcome to the forum mate, hope you enjoy it as much as we do. What type of shrimp do you want to get? Also, some pics of the marine shrimp would be cool to see, I used to have banded cleaner & pacific cleaner shrimp, that was a while ago, don't have any marine tanks anymore, hopefully that will change :encouragement:

[Baccus]

G'Day and Welcome to the forum, lots of great members here and great information for anyone starting out with fresh water shrimp.

[Neo-shrimp]

Welcome to SKF Byron...If you have any particular questions just fire away with a thread into whichever category and the friendly members will assist you...Have fun mate with your freshwater shrimp hobby...CJ:encouragement:

[OzShrimp]

Welcome to SKF :)

[MrShrimp]

Your going to love freshwater shrimps as they will multiply in no time. I used to keep marine crustation but they never breed for me. Good luck , it's going to be fun ( if you do it right) :)

[izzy]

Hello there from NY. Welcome to SKF Byron.

[fishmosy]

Welcome to SKF Byron, always great to have overseas members here.

[wayne6442]

Welcome Byron, we don't have the variety of shrimp here in Australia that you will be able to access, but we are a great bunch of dedicated shrimp keepers and breeders with a wealth of information that is world class. ENJOY SKF Mate !

[CNgo2006]

Welcome and let loose, we are a fun bunch so have fun on skf. Oh and we love photos so when you are up and running post up some pics

[uny2bld]

Wow! Thanks for all the warm welcomes everyone! It's cool to see an active forum :)

Hey Byron, welcome to the forum mate, hope you enjoy it as much as we do. What type of shrimp do you want to get? Also, some pics of the marine shrimp would be cool to see, I used to have banded cleaner & pacific cleaner shrimp, that was a while ago, don't have any marine tanks anymore, hopefully that will change

I wouldn't ask what type of shrimp I want to get because I just remolded my basement to build several racks for different species of shrimp... I kind of go overboard on everything I do (Or so I have been told by everyone) I kept seeing the "shrimp tanks" for sale such as the fluval ones in our lfs's but then not a single lfs had shrimp for sale (save for some ghost shrimp and if you're very lucky a bumble bee...) None of the others shown on the box were available... So, I want to change that (being a crustacean lover and all ;) There are a bunch that stick out to me. The Blue Tiger shrimp and the starry nights are some of my immediate favorites but I really like too many so I need to start off with my first tank and see how it goes... Here are some pics of my marine crusties: This is my "Prized fighter" with his purple boxing gloves - lol He's a bullseye snapping shrimp and he's super interesting to watch! This is my sea apple - it's not a crusty but it had a small crusty in it (An unidentified crab) when I put the apple in qt, I looked a day later and saw a crab appeared... so I think it might have been some sort of a symbiotic relationship. Never got a pic of the crab but this is what the apple looks like: This is a pic of my coral banded shrimp: (Sorry I couldn't get a good quality pic) this is my pet Stone Crab :) This one is a pic of my red snapping shrimp. I actually have a mated pair but the other one is off camera: I also have a purple lobster and a couple mantis shrimp. I'll have to get pics of them soon. I was going to attempt to breed fire shrimp (also a marine crusty) but I won't start that project until after I get some dwarf shrimp systems up and running ;)

[fish4fish3]

Thats shrimptastic!

For a second there I thought the snapping was a pistol. They're cool too. Have any of those? Then again I don't think they would go too well in a glass tank since the friction of the compressed air bubbles is hotter than the sun!

Keep us posted on how things unveil in the shrimp room as we are always keen on learning about different variants.

welcome to SKF

we love pics!

Cheers Roman

[uny2bld]

Oh yes, before I forget, the tank I'm setting up first is for crystal Reds. I wasn't going to get them right away since I like others better but I went to see a contact for something marine related and he had these amazing specimens that I just could not pass up on. He said that I could come back anytime to get some.

The tank I want them to go in is set up right now as a marine tank so I need to break it down and then set it up as a shrimp tank. I will need to order sand though since the one I want isn't available in stores (ASA Aquasoil)

So... I am still probably looking at another 6 weeks before I can get them but it's worth the wait.

[uny2bld]

Thats shrimptastic!

For a second there I thought the snapping was a pistol. They're cool too. Have any of those? Then again I don't think they would go too well in a glass tank since the friction of the compressed air bubbles is hotter than the sun!

Keep us posted on how things unveil in the shrimp room as we are always keen on learning about different variants.

welcome to SKF

we love pics!

Cheers Roman

No, you were right, they are pistols. They just use the terms "Snapping" and "Pistol" interchangeably... This one is called "Red Caribbean Pistol Shrimp - Alpheus sp"

[Squiggle]

Wow dude, that's a pretty cool collection you got there, your bullseye snapper is awesome! Can't wait to see some pics of the shrimp room, very keen for that :encouragement:

[uny2bld]

Keep us posted on how things unveil in the shrimp room as we are always keen on learning about different variants.

Definitely will...

I guess I will ask my first few questions

here:

For biological filtration, I am seriously considering two

options. One is kaldness media. As far as any bio-media goes, this seems

like a no-brainer. I have read nothing but great reviews in the high-end

marine breeding sites, plus I have first hand experience working in my friends

marine aquaculture facility and it gives better results than any other media out

there.

That said, it is imo, the best biological "media"... however, I am still not

convinced that it out-performs a well constructed sand filter. I have some crazy

huge PVC pipe that was given to me. It's super thick and wider than a 5 gallon

bucket. I was thinking of making sand filters out of this stuff. I can't

possibly think that anything out there would be a better biological filter than

a sand filter. The surface area alone is unbeatable per volume.

Does

anyone here have experience with sand filters? any thoughts on my line of

thinking here?

[fishmosy]

Sand filters can require alot of water pressure to operate properly. Thus they require big pumps with equally high power consumption. Electricity prices here are only getting higher, not sure what it is like over there, so there isn't alot of sand filters used here unless you are talking commercial setups. K1 Kaldness can be used in small air driven filters that work great in small shrimp tanks. There are a few threads on these in this forum so check them out for inspiration, particularly those by alvinchan80.

[uny2bld]

sweet - thanks for the input. I will check it out.