Berried rcs and water changes

[Chindy]

Hi guys I've finally got my shrimp thriving have just done about a 30% water change and noticed one of my shrimp has eggs will I lose them now from changing water

[Madmerv]

Hi @Chindy

Providing you used a quality dechlorinator and matched the temp some what, it will be fine. RCS are a pretty hardy lot and there is not much, apart from bad water parameters, that will knock a berried female around.

Good luck with your shrimpets.

[NoGi]

^^what he said.

As long as you didn't stress them out during the water change you'll be fine.

[Chindy]

thanks guys its taken me a while to get this far. now i have a lot of saddled females looks like ill be up for another tank. how many shrimp do you reckon would be fine in a 120 litre tank and when is the best age to move the babies if I end up with too many

[Madmerv]

Hi @Chindy

120 litre tank is on the larger size for a shrimp only tank. Good job as it helps to keep the water stable with such a large volume.

You could probably keep several hundred in a tank that size as long as you keep their water clean, lowish nitrates etc, and had plenty of plants/moss for them to graze off. 

Baby shrimp can be moved pretty well anytime after you can actually see them. Get yourself a proper shrimp net with super fine mesh so there is no entanglements and do a regular cull. This is the removing of any shrimp that does not come up to your high standards.. lol.. I laugh because my own tank quickly became populated with sub standard RCS as i didnt want to cull any. Big mistake on my part.

Post some pics so we can see what you have.

[Buggins]

I've got some blue velvet cross RCS females that have just dropped healthy babies after being moved to an unheated tank with slightly different water parameters so I wouldn't worry to much. Totally agree with Madmerv. I think your only danger would be overfeeding. They are scavengers so they don't need to be fed every day. But they will always prioritize eating food you've given them over grazing biofilm to stop the food you give them fouling the water. Having plants, mosses and wood for them to graze is a good plan. And if their environment is dirty your probably overfeeding them

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[Chindy]

thanks for the help people will put some picks up soon

[Chindy]

the berried female must have been hiding for a while i just spotted 2 shrimplets today so stoked. ill put some photos up when there closer to the edge took a couple but they are blurry way to small to focus on

[Madmerv]

Congratulations @Chindy. The first of a great many we hope.

[Zoidburg]

I read that someone sold off their collection of shrimp and once all was said and done they averaged out about 2,000 shrimp per ~37 litres...

So, in theory, you could have 6,000 shrimp in the tank you have, as long as it's got good filtration and there's plenty of food. Should you allow a colony to grow that large in that size tank? Not necessarily, but it goes to show that you can have *A LOT* of shrimp!

 

Congrats on your shrimplets!

[Chindy]

shrimplets are hard to see only seem to spot 2 at a time every other day I hope there is more.the ones ive spotted are showing a nice red is that a good sign of the quality or is it to early to really tell yet

 

[Zoidburg]

It can take months for baby shrimp to reach full adult coloration, but if they are showing some color now, take it as a good sign! :)