journal Our Scape #2

[AwwYea]

 

 

 

 

Just thought I would briefly share our current scape. It's been kicking about for 22+ weeks now :)

Unfortunately it has also been the death-place of over 100 red cherry shrimp over the course of it's existence.

Introduced 20 at a time over 5 periods (all with different water parameters at each extreme); they just don't like this tank.

To this day it continues to remain uninhabited by shrimp and will be decommissioned soon for a complete reset.

 

Our first scape before it was decommissioned:

http://shrimpkeepersforum.com/forum/index.php/topic/3152-dsm-mr-aqua-12g-3ft-bookshelf/#entry3152

Edited June 22, 2014 by AwwYea

[AwwYea]

Equipment

Mr Aqua 12G (3ft Bookshelf - 90 x 21 x 24cm - 45litres~)

UP Aqua Pro Z LED

Eheim 2217

Hydor ETH 200w

 

Tunze CO2 Regulator

KegKing 2.6kg Cylinder

Max Mix CO2 Reactor (Medium)

Cal Aqua X1 Nano Inflow

gUSH oJet Mini 

 

 

Substrate and Flora

CAL Black Earth Premium

Mr. Aqua Soil (Used as foundation for the slope)

ADA Decorative Sand (Mekong)

Seiryu Stones

 

Cuba (Hemianthus Callitrichoides)

Pearl Weed (Hemianthus Micranthemoides)

 

Mini Fissidens

Mini Hydrocotyle (Hydrocotyle Tripartita)

 

Mini Pellia (Riccardia Chamedryfolia)

 

 

 

Timeline of the tank:

 

Edited June 22, 2014 by AwwYea

[Squiggle]

Looks absolutely fantastic dude, amazing stuff! Spewing that you can't figure out the shrimp situation.

[AwwYea]

Week 11:

 

 

[AwwYea]

Looks absolutely fantastic dude, amazing stuff! Spewing that you can't figure out the shrimp situation.

Thanks Squiggle!

We've tried to pinpoint everything... even making the plants suffer through a really low fert phase at one stage haha!

 

Right now there is 500ml of Macropore sitting in the filter for 45L~ of water.

That's a ratio of 1:50 the recommended dosage. So it should be absorbing every single impurity! The shrimp still perished :(

[Squiggle]

Thanks Squiggle!

We've tried to pinpoint everything... even making the plants suffer through a really low fert phase at one stage haha!

 

Right now there is 500ml of Macropore sitting in the filter for 45L~ of water.

That's a ratio of 1:50 the recommended dosage. So it should be absorbing every single impurity! The shrimp still perished :(

This is something simple that was raise with me the other day & definitely something that could be missed with this style of tank, have you though about the dissolved oxygen level in the water?

[AwwYea]

This is something simple that was raise with me the other day & definitely something that could be missed with this style of tank, have you though about the dissolved oxygen level in the water?

 

We tested that as well by extracting a container of tank water about 6 hours before the CO2 was due to switch on (had plenty of time to re-oxygenate from the night before).

Popped a few cherries in and *poof* dead an hour later! So definitely something in the water column :(

[Squiggle]

Hmmmmmmm, that's definitely a very big head scratcher dude. Have you checked other toxic elements, like copper etc?

[petfish]

love it, a very nice scape

[poeticwinter]

stunning aquascape love it. should be awesome for shrimp tank. but i think the co2 and ferts contains harmful toxic ingredients or high ferts can make them suffer. hence why people keeping shrimp only using low tech plant or mosses as they are no need co2 and fertilizer to grow

[jayc]

 

We've tried to pinpoint everything... 

 

I'll bet it's either 

1) Seiryu Stones - these are limestone, and will raise TDS overtime. I have some myself and found it to impact water parameters too much to use in a tank with shrimp. Find out what your TDS is with a TDS pen.

 

or

 

2) CO2 dosage is too high for shrimps. Thus reducing oxygen levels. Shrimp like very oxygenated water. It might not be good for your plants to lower CO2 however. In which case, you will have to strike a happy balance between shrimp and plants by selecting slow grow plants (eg mosses) that don't need CO2.

[AwwYea]

Hmmmmmmm, that's definitely a very big head scratcher dude. Have you checked other toxic elements, like copper etc?

 

Yup Copper was a negative!

 

 

I'll bet it's either 

1) Seiryu Stones - these are limestone, and will raise TDS overtime. I have some myself and found it to impact water parameters too much to use in a tank with shrimp. Find out what your TDS is with a TDS pen.

 

Have a TDS pen coming so will definitely be checking that quite soon :)

[Squiggle]

Definitely check the TDS, as jayc said, the rocks could be making the TDS rise over time.

[petfish]

how many BPS are you running the co2 at?and are you running air when lights are out?

Edited June 23, 2014 by petfish

[slin1977]

Congratulations on a mighty fine scape. Sad day when it gets re-scaped :-(

[AwwYea]

Definitely check the TDS, as jayc said, the rocks could be making the TDS rise over time.

 

TDS was over 500! Why didn't I check it sooner...

 

how many BPS are you running the co2 at?and are you running air when lights are out?

We were running CO2 at about 2bps. It came in green @ about 23.9ppm.

No air was introduced during lights out :(

 

 

Congratulations on a mighty fine scape. Sad day when it gets re-scaped :-(

Thanks! But it is indeed sad...

 

 

TANK IS NOW DECOMMISSIONED

[jayc]

TDS was over 500! Why didn't I check it sooner...

 

 

That would have been the problem. 

 

As I mentioned, Seiryu will raise TDS.

The more you have, the higher TDS will rise. 

In a 45L Mr Aqua tank, no more than 1 small piece should be used. 

[AwwYea]

At least we finally discovered the root of our problem! Wish we did it sooner before committing so many shrimps to their certain deaths :(

 

But we are happy now that we know so going forward we can keep shrimp properly

[Squiggle]

Wow that's high, well spotted @jayc, just goes to show you need to follow the K.I.S.S mentality!

 

Sad to know that beautiful tank has been decommissioned though.

[FishBeast]

I look forward to seeing the re-scape

[Shrimp Aqua]

Sorry about all of your losses AwwYea, i suspect a lesson well learned, it is so devastating to see your shrimp perishing and not knowing WHY!! let alone having to start over again.  I guess it is all part of the huge learning curve and all you can do is put down to experience and log it into the memory bank.  Good luck on the restart i am sure it will not happen again.