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I'll put up a Boss Aquaria pack for a prize & a pack of Mineral Balls & Crack for the idea that we use for that comp!

A low quality photo of my Mosura JRB to share: Sorry for the poor quality. Too tired from work, and I was too lazy to setup the flash and tripod. (^_^")y

mm balls and cracks

My cherries have adapted to low KH (~1). The key is to keep KH stable. Cherries can adapt to higher KH and pH, the person that sold you the shrimps might have kept them at a higher KH and pH, so the idea there is to maintain a similar level. It doesn't mean that cherries can't survive at lower KH values. Drip acclimatise them to your water parameters, and keep that steady. Similarly, my cherries do well at lower pH too, as a result of the lower KH. The natural (slow) drop in pH due to the nitrification process by bacteria will not stress the shrimp. You could try a couple of seashells or corals in the filter or tank to maintain KH. Even egg shells might work ok to maintain KH. But you have to experiment with the amount. But don't forget, make the changes slowly, stability is the key.

It should last much longer than that; you can get easy 2 weeks from a yeast brew which is the way to go if you can't make the citric acid system work. Check out this thread, the aussie about half way down page 3 seems to have worked it out. Sounds like you've probably got a leak. http://www.aquaticquotient.com/forum/showthread.php/94956-DIY-CO2-System-Aquarium-Plant-Kit-CO2-Diffuser-Generator/page3 Hope that helps. There's also some basic instructions on this kit for anyone interested: http://www.co2supermarket.co.uk/diy-co2-kit-setup-instructions/

Several weeks ago my partner and I put in an order with Aquagreen for some DAS and DRNs. We also picked up some Blue Eyes for his tank that are gorgeous. Because my tank wasn't ready, my shrimp went into his 'fry' tank, which is actually a tank for Mr Shoggoth, the mystery snail. Shoggoth was getting harassed by the danios in the main tank so he got his own space which he seems pretty happy with. Today I went over and we pulled out the furniture in that tank and I transferred them into buckets for the trip home, which was thankfully very short. Everything I've read about DRNs being jumpers is true. Three DRN made desperate bids for freedom during transfer and had to be rescued. I hope that didn't traumatise them too much and they're ok, although one now seems to have a bubble stuck in his carapace. Aren't DRNs supercute? Even though they are the least shy, they seem to be the hardest to photograph, they do tend to move a lot. I can already see that the DAS are extremely under rated. They're gorgeous, variable in colour and pattern, and eat like demons. There was a diatom issue in my partner's main tank, and the DAS he put in there loved it. There was also a strange flat black algae, (definitely not BBA, maybe a variant of green spot algae?), growing on his anubias. It wouldn't rub or scrape off the leaf at all, yet the DAS have almost eliminated it. Here's some of the DAS, showing the variation in patterns in just a handful of them. Some nice black stripes along the sides of this one. Love the white spots all over this one. Terrible colour balance for this photo because it was sitting just under the lights, but it shows some nice black striping with white spots. Finally there was a surprise as well. One night spotted something in the tank and my first thought was 'Red Cherry', but it couldn't be because we don't have any cherries at all. Then I realised it must be a Chameleon, it scuttled out of sight before I could show my partner. Today when we pulled all the furniture out of the fry tank to net out the shrimp we discovered that there were two Chameleons in there, so they came home with me too. They were a dark brown today, but tonight I found one under the driftwood and it was looking red. These guys seem to be incredibly shy and hard to spot. Terrible photo, but it was the best I could do trying to aim a penlight and a camera at the same time. I'd like to give a shout out to Aquagreen. As I've read many times, Dave was great to deal with, simple and easy to order and everyone arrived happy and healthy, quickly and in great packaging. Actually many of the shrimp were berried, but dropped while still in my partner's tank. In fact I'm very tempted to put in another order to double my number of DRNs and DAS, and maybe grab a couple more Chameleons while I'm at it.