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zebra shrimp conditions


revolutionhope

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autotrophs and autobots are pretty much the same thing :-)

fwiw ive used fishless method once before (now i can pinch media from other systems of course and i do that instead) but i had no measurable ammonia or nitrite as a result of sprinkling a little powdered fish fopd every few days to create a cycle and establish the nitrifying bacteria before adding a very small quantity of livestock and then feeding sparingly and gradually increasing over first couple of weeks.

one thing ive always wondered about those autobots is how long they survive (while immersed and oxygenated ofc) but without N to process?

if anyone has a link for an article that covers this I'd rly rly appreciate it!

o ya back to zebs - personally since reading up more ive decided to go with a larger tank, more filtration than i planned - eheim canister with good amount of macropore and activated carbon as well as two airdriven sponges

and maybe even a teeny weeny internal PF to ensure good flow all around?

ill be using RO with a very very small quantity of jayc diy mix.

I will try to keep most of the food as natural as per bobs advice.

something im really not sure about though is pH? ive always used a system with a good amount of carbonates before so how do I neutralise my acidic RO water and how do I ensure pH doesnt swing with lights on/off (ie plantlife expelling co2 overnight)

what do y'all think about my intentions for how to keep them?? im sorry for writing an essay as I usually do !! :-)

love n peace

will

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Your setup sounds like it should do well. Running both macropore and carbon is a bit of an overkill though.

I'm not sure why your RO would be acidic, perhaps it has a bit of CO2 dissolved in it. If so, aeration and letting it sit overnight should bring the pH back up.

Zebs dont have plants in their habitats in the wild, only mosses. That said, I seem to remember that Wayne had his zebs in with plants and they did OK. Overnight pH swings mustn't be too much of a problem then.

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thanks for the headsup mosy i will stick with just mosses then. i wonder if one type or another of moss might be better? i think the most common aquarium mosses are not native so perhaps it would help if i get a hold of some native mosses if anyone can sell me any? im going to take my time setting up this tank, i will have a lot more spare time on my hands in the second-half of july so i might end up just learning what i can learn until then!

 

re acidic Ro water - i haven't actually tested pH of my water  funnily enough, but it is actually RO/DI and not just regular RO water so i wodner if that would make a difference? because it is a dual use (aquarium as well as drinking water) unit i got it from filter systems australia as recommended by disciple and other forum members  - it mentions in the instructions that the aquarium water is acidic, hence why they use an calcium-carbonite alkalizing cartridge which is in use if i choose to use the drinking water outlet? im still getting my head around basic water chemistry despite asking a million questions of dear SKF regulars such as yourself and others in the past few months  heheh.

 

im not surprised that macropore and carbon have some overlap in function -  but isn't activated carbon better for removing inorganic (as well as organic) nasties while macropore is specifically better at absorbing organic compounds from the water column?

 

i raelised i haven't really touched on the subject of what actually to keep in the aquarium - im assuming that is best to keep only inert substrate and hardscape and also best not to use any driftwood? i have a sera blackwater conditioner product that i've been using with my cherries, it seems to only up the TDS by a couple millisiemens or so - would it be wise to use that or should i just rely on ageing my water?

 

im very much looking forward to getting any input/advice people can offer me!!

 

love n peace

 

will

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I think any moss that will grow in the low TDS conditions of a zebra tank would be fine. If you look in my Tully Gorge thread, there are pics in there showing the moss in the zebra habitats. Looks similar to many exotic species such as peacock and Xmas.

I suspect that the basic chemistry behind why your RO may be acidic is because When CO2 dissolves in water, it forms a weak acid called carbonic acid. Normally chemicals in water such as carbonates react with the carbonic acid to neutralise it, But since in RO these chemicals have been removed, they cant neutralise the carbonic acid and therefore the pH is low (acidic). My understanding is that the drinking water section of the RO unit adds a chemical to neutralise the carbonic acid and therefore the pH is not acidic (I could be wrong but thats my understanding). Easy way to test if this is true is to measure the TDS from the RO unit with and without the water passing through the drinking water section.

If you are using remineralised RO and inert substrate, then I cant imagine that there would be many inorganic nasties (thinking heavy metals, ect.) so macropore should be enough to remove the chemicals of most concern (particularly nitrogenous wastes - ammonia, nitrite, nitrate). I tend not to use carbon in any of my shrimp tanks unless it is for a specific purpose (e.g. Removing leftover medicine) which is extremely rare.

In terms of adding wood, I added a tiny piece of driftwood to my last setup. The shrimp seemed to do well with it. I definitely wouldn't add alot as there isn't a great deal of large wood in their natural habitat, but there are lots of leaves and some twigs.

I dont know enough about the blackwater product you suggested to reccomend using it or not. I can reccomend using benibachi minerals as Squiggle used it with success, and I'm currently using it to remineralise RO for my zeb tank, and some other native shrimp tanks as well. I dont think the benibachi is a complete solution as I suspect it doesn't contain all the trace vitamins and minerals that the zebs may require to look their best and maintain their health over the long term. Can the food we feed the zebs provide these? I dont know for certain. Its something I'm currently looking into.

Inert substrate is a definite must. Its hard enough to maintain a low TDS in a zeb tank without adding the headache of minerals leaching from your substrate.

Edited by fishmosy
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They certainly are an odd shrimp.  Mine spend a lot of time grazing on the sponge filter.  A small number are seen out grazing on leaves, but its very low impact grazing - not like DAS or C. typus that will pick a mulberry leaf and smash it.  They seem to hit old IAL more than any other I throw in there but the consumption is evident by the slow loss of leaf tissue, not because I see the shrimp in the motions of eating it much... Most of the action seems to happens in the middle of the night (sneaking up on them with a torch reveals more out and about).  Any prepared foods I've added have been largely ignored and had to be removed when they got nasty - so far tried  NLS H2O stable wafer, Hikari mini wafers, AoA home brand wafers, Axolotl pellets (higher protein), Hikari crab cuisine,  even a few pellets of barramundi food.   I have unlimited leaves pre-soaked and loaded with biofilm in my pond so that + mulberry + IAL + the odd blanched nettle is hopefully enough.

 

My rain water is very clean at the moment (EC 40 µS/cm  ~ TDS=20ppm) and with just a thin layer of inert sand and a few small granite stones the tank was sitting at ~60µS/cm.  I've recently added some DIY booster to bring it up to EC ~100+µS/cm  to see if this changes their appetite.

Edited by Grubs
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Try vegetable based foods like benibachi kale pellets (Available from our forum sponsors). Mine smash it but I only feed small amounts every second day or so. I dont think alot of fishmeal/animal protein in their diet is a good thing. Leaves and biofilm seem to constitute the majority of their diet in the wild.

Its strange that your zebs seem to be more active at night. Bobs zebs in his ponds hide away until morning, and during the day they are out in the open everywhere. Early one morning just after sunrise I looked in his pond and couldn't see a single shrimp. Bob lifted the pump and filter and all (several hundred) were hiding under there. In the wild they are out in the open during the middle of the day too. Mine seem to roam the tank when the lights are on. Haven't looked at them at night.

Edited by fishmosy
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Interesting. My zebs have ignored any foods I've added too, including dandelion leaf and shrimp crack. Most other natives smash these.  The zebs seem to only be interested in the biofilm in the tank and are constantly eating it from old leaves and substrate. It will be interesting to see what they do as the biofilm thins out. Good luck with them guys! 

 

Fishmosy, did you and Bob make it to "black zeb creek"? So keen to see your photos man! BTW if you've got some Malandas take your pics immediately when they're looking good. Have some babies now and after dropping them mum was the most amazing blue colour. Next day normal blue again. 

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If your zebs are ignoring food, be careful not to leave it there or add more. From my last attempt and my current attempt so far, I dont think you should feed zebs everyday. They seem to do really well on small amounts of food. Less food also allows you greater control over water parameters. Remembering too that leaves act the same way as pellets - they add nutrients to the tank.

Didn't make it to black zeb creek because the weather wasn't on our side. I'll be putting pics and vids up soon. Thanks for the tip about the Malanda. Mine are currently in temporary housing until their tank is set up properly. Have you got pics yet?

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Yeah I'm not feeding them at all Ben, they don't take it so why bother? Like Grubs I have an endless supply of biofilm rich leaves in outdoor ponds so will stick to that for now. I'll just add the odd bit of feed now and then to see how they react. 

 

No pics of the Malandas, have seen a decent one of a berried female nice and blue. The girl I should have photographed looked really amazing one day, about a day after she dropped. Then back to normal. She's not berried again yet so likely not a strategy to attract males? They're really nice shrimp though huh. 

 

Shame you missed out on black zeb creek, I really wanted to see pics and bet you're more disappointed than me! Do you know if there's any pics of black zebs around? Bob? 

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Might be a sign of stress. Lots of native shrimp turn blue when stressed. I think Bob has pics that show the Malanda turn blue when held in a bucket after they are caught.

I dont know if Bob has pics of the black zebs. Have to ask.

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That could certainly be it but I don't think so, I think females just tend to come up bluish and males reddish. All the babies are also reddish.

 

We should get a feel for them over time, let's see what happens. They seem to be lovely shrimp.

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Yes they definitely have a blue or red colour, but the intensity seems to increase under stress. Definitely one shrimp with a great future in the hobby.

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Forgot to mention, Zebs also love Boss Aquarias Shrimp Snow. Remembered that I'd fed mine with it last time. Fed my new zebs with it today and they went nuts for it. 

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  • 1 month later...

what minerals are people specifically using to their RO for these?

i currently have 2 options - jayc DIY mix (calcium sulphate dihydrate, potassium sulphate, and magnesium sulphate as well as micro-nutrient/trace-mix if that is a good idea) and i also have salty shrimp neo - GH/KH+

]my RO/DI water is about 4 uS.., i will have plenty of surface agitation as suggested by ben to ensure consistent oxygen and co2 levels etc.

Still have time for a techden order to arrive before the zebs - if regular bee shrimp GH+ is going to be significantly better than my current choices.

if bob is able i will have these next week, all my dreams will come true and i'll finally be initiated into the zebra crew WOOOHOO :-D

love n peace

will

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I'll keep my eye out for your post in the next week or two and welcome you to the club!

To be honest Will, I have either not or only barely used any minerals for these. The tap water and rainwater for that matter are both hard enough for my liking and I've actually done a couple of water changes with straight RO to keep the EC under control. When I move to all RO water I'll be using a salt like Salty GH+, which is I'm pretty sure what Ben is doing. 

If you can go DIY salts I don't think there will be much difference to using Salty. You could almost certainly just use a percentage of dechlorinated/carbon filtered tapwater to adjust the hardness. 

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I've been using pure rainwater at ~ 30-40 µS.  About 1 in 4-5 water changes I put a very small amount (couple of rice grains only) of DIY GH booster just to add some Ca/Mg.  This might be a total waste of time, but my logic is the rainwater is coming off a colourbond roof into stainless steel tanks so the residual conductivity is likely to be of organic origin rather than mineral (100% assumption)... Ca is often implicated as important for moulting.. so I'm just making sure there is a whiff of it in the water without actually measuring it (not very scientific).  With the recent influx of fresh rainwater in Melbourne the EC in the tanks is dropping further.

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