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25!!! Weekend feeder block is the cause. Those blocks are usually too large and is way more than needed for shrimps. I'm not even certain if they contain any nutritious ingredients for shrimp. My advise is to never use them. If you are away a week, the shrimp will be fine for that week if fed before leaving. If it's longer than a week to 2weeks, IAL (Indian Almond Leaves or Catappa) are good, as is "Snow Flake" food. They don't foul your water or water parameters. Add more IAL or snow flake if going away for 3 weeks. 4weeks or more, you might need to get someone to come in to drop a portion of food into the tank that you have prepared. Shrimps don't eat much, so they can go a week with just one feed. In fact, have enough IAL in the tank and shrimps can live on it for several weeks. IAL breakdown very slowly, and have the added benefit of releasing tannins. Fresh veges are also great vacation foods. Drop in some blanched zucchinis, carrots, mulberry leaves, etc. They are much more nutritious than feeder blocks and can last just as long. Nothing stopping you from using a combination of the above as well, as those different foods, can last for various lengths of time. There are a lot more options in the Food & Nutrition section of this forum. Have a read of the various types of vegetables, leaves, flowers, and premade foods you can use the next time you are on vacation. Keep doing water changes with your RO water to reduce GH. The block might have "melted" or dropped particles into the substrate, thus keeping your GH high. Try vacuuming the substrate where the block was sitting. Keep doing your water changes and GH should come down. Try to match your water change with the parameters you have in the tank, except for GH and TDS. This keeps the shock of changing parameters too quickly from disturbing the shrimp. Get yourself a TDS meter, if you don't have one. It's the best and most useful tool for any aquarist. Just so people know .... those white feeder blocks are typically made up of the following... Calcium Sulfate, Fish Meal, Flash Dried Blood Meal (non ruminant), Poultry By-Product Meal, Soybean Meal, Wheat, Wheat Flour, Fish Oil, Lecithin, Iron Oxide, L-Ascorbyl-2-Polyphosphate (stabilized Vitamin C), Dicalcium Phosphate, Choline Chloride, Niacin, Thiamine Hydrochloride, d-Calcium Pantothenate, Pyridoxine Hydrochloride, Biotin, Beta Carotene, Vitamin E Supplement, Riboflavin, Thiamine Mononitrate, Folic Acid, Vitamin A Supplement, Vitamin D3 Supplement, Vitamin B12 Supplement, Manganese Sulfate, Zinc Sulfate, Ferrous Sulfate, Copper Sulfate, Sodium Selenite, Potassium Iodate, Propionic Acid (a natural preservative), Ethoxyquin (preservative). Ingredients go from the most abundant to least in decreasing order, but we don't have the exact quantities. Let's breakdown what this means. Calcium Sulfate is the main ingredient. Don't know the % content, but CaSO4 is what gives it the white colour. And since I can't see evidence of anything else of the next few ingredients in the block, we can assume CaSO4 is the predominant ingredient. CaSO4 is what we use to remineralise RO water like that used in products like Salty Shrimp GH+. Imagine the small amount of loose Salty shrimp needed to raise TDS and GH of RO water. Then imagine the amount that is in this compacted feeder block. GH and TDS will go nuts! Lastly CaSO4 is NOT food! When was the last time anyone fed calcium sulfate to their fish or shrimp. It is used as a binder, which slowly melts to release whatever minuscule amounts of food is compacted into the block. CaSO4 is used because it doesn't impact pH. You will see some brands claim it stabilises pH, yeah dur, that's cause it buffers the water with huge amounts of calcium. At least your shrimp will have a huge overdose of Calcium. BUT, there is always a but/compromise. Too much Calcium causes the water to become hard, as reflected by the high GH reading. Water that is too hard will cause issues with breeding, as eggs become too hard for sperm to penetrate. And shrimps will find it harder to moult. They can use up too much energy trying to moult and can lead to death. Or they rip limbs off trying to get out of the old shell. Either way it's not good for them. Fish Meal - ok. That at least is food for fish or shrimp. This is the only ingredient that we can consider food for fish and shrimp. But how much of it is in there? Is this even 50% of the feeder block? 25%? Try melting off the CaSO4 and find pieces of fish meal. Flash Dried Blood Meal (non ruminant), Poultry By-Product Meal, Soybean Meal, Wheat, Wheat Flour: Not food for fish or shrimp at least, and probably in such small amounts per block that it is immeasurable. Soybean meal might be ok for shrimp at least. But again, it's probably not much in there per block. None of these ingredients here are for fish either. What fish would naturally eat any of these? NONE. Fish Oil: not food either. It's just trace amounts that results from adding Fish meal above. The rest are all minerals and vitamins that might have been added in trace amounts or is found in the CaSO4 and Fish meal, dried blood, poultry by product, soybean, and wheat. Whether it is needed or not, it is being added into the tank, and contributes to increased GH and TDS. It is unlikely the manufacturers added any additional minerals or vitamins here - reason? it costs extra money. That means, this is just minerals & vitamins already found in the ingredients I mentioned above. Propionic Acid (a natural preservative), Ethoxyquin (preservative): just preservatives to keep the block from going mouldy. Certainly not food. Hopefully that helps someone the next time they want to contemplate using feeder blocks vs natural foods.