# Help! My shrimp keep dying



## MiamiAG (Jan 13, 2004)

OK. Bear with me here. The last time I set up a planted aquarium was when you couldn't buy yamato numa-ebi in the US.

I put 45 of those suckers into my 1 month old aquarium and within 24 hours all were dead. REALLY ticked me off at $2+ each.

Tank stats:

temp: 76-77F
pH: 6.9-7
NH4: 0
NO2: 0
NO3: 10-15 ppm
PO4: 1.3 ppm
GH: 3 dH
KH: 3 dH
Fe: .1-.3 ppm
Cu: 0

I use RO/DI water.

Any thoughts?


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## Anonymous (Jan 13, 2004)

Art,

Your aquarium values should be fine (btw, where did you get the amano shrimp in Miami?) for Amano Shrimp.

My 20g long in Chicago has A LOT of shrimp and it's not much 
different from yours. I have 9 amano shrimp (Cardina japonica) and 
5 cherry red shrimp (Neocardina denticulata var.) which have been
living in there for about two months with no problems. I recently
added five crystal red shrimp (Neocardina serrata var) last week, no
problems. I really don't know what I am doing right, since most people
have trouble keeping bee shrimp/cherry red shrimp in heavily
fertilized, carbon dioxide injected tanks. They feed off of algae and just
the regular dried food I feed my fish (OSI Flakes and Brine Shrimp Plus flakes).

My tank specs:

20g long
NO3: 5-10 ppm
PO4: 0.5-1.0 ppm
GH: 12
KH: 9.5
pH 6.6 (that's right...)

I used to have a breeding colony of ghost shrimp back in Miami.
I had lots of little baby shrimp popping up all the time. After I 
reaquascaped the tank though, they all disappeared (down the
gullet of my angelfish, most likely...).

Carlos


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## tsunami (Jan 24, 2004)

Oops. That was me. :roll: 

Carlos


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## Justin Fournier (Jan 27, 2004)

IME, shrimp are very sensitive to heavy metals in the water. On more then one occasion have I had a number of shrimp die off soon after adding 20mL of Tropica Master Grow to my 75G tank. Every dose seemed to kill a couple, even if I spread it out over a week in 5mL doses, they just died one after the other. Do you add traces?

In an old Non C02 tank I had, the shrimp population thrived. They did very well for years, readily reporducing and once in a while a small shrimp joined it's parents. 

At work we have a 220G planted tank that breeds cherry shrimp like they were cockroaches. They were even breeding in a small unfiltered pond with no moving water or filters, just plant cuttings from the display.

None of the above three systems had any ferts containing metals.


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## MiamiAG (Jan 13, 2004)

Heavy metals, huh? I certainly do dose. It is a high light/CO2 tank that requires a heavy fertilization regimen. Wonder how Amano does it?


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## Anonymous (Jan 13, 2004)

Well, IME, heavy metals aren't or never haven't killed my amano shrimp in either my Chicago tank or Miami tank.

Both high light/CO2, loads of Flourish/Flourish Iron (15-20 mL weekly).

Carlos


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## tsunami (Jan 24, 2004)

That's me, yet again. :roll:

Carlos


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## gnome (Jan 27, 2004)

Hi, Everybody!

Carlos, thanks for e-mailing me a link to this site! This is really cool. 

Justin mentioned TMG. My Amano shrimp HATED that stuff. It was the only time I had regular suicides. I would only add a few drops to my small tanks (5.5-gallon, Eclipse System three, etc.) and they'd immediately start sprinting laps. It's not as bad with Flourish, but still I use all products sparingly and spread it out to dose daily. 

I remember a thread at another forum where we were discussing the contents of various fertilizers. TMG had something like 0.006% Cu (don't quote me on that) while Flourish has 0.0001% (Flourish trace definitely has much more). Somebody else mentioned Yamato Green products, and I believe they had the lowest Cu content. 

Pretty much all heavy metals do bad things to invertebrates even at very low concentrations. Another culprit is residual insecticides on emerse-grown plants. It's a common practice in the Far East where beetles can be a major problem. I'm pretty sure this was the cause of a shrimp die-off I experienced about a year ago. Either way, it was all pointing to a dwarf Lobelia cardinalis that still had much of its emersed growth intact. My fish were fine, and all but one shrimp died within the next 72 hours. 

Hope you figure out what killed your shrimp. Sorry to hear about the big (and expensive) loss. 

-Naomi


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## gnome (Jan 27, 2004)

I wanted to make a correction. I looked up the analysis for Yamato Green, and it says 0.0015% Cu. So it appears to have more than Flourish, but less than Flourish Trace.


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## shannon (Jan 30, 2004)

*shrimp deaths*

Hi Art- sorry about your shrimp. I'm just getting ready to add my first ones and I'm very excited.
Arizona Aquatic gardens has a wonderful section called "shrimp factory" on their web site. You may already be familiar with it. I would give you the link, but I'm a computer newbie  This section not only offers several different types of shrimp but tells us what water parameters each likes and gives all kinds of advice..example..a little iodine works wonders, but a little copper kills. Hope you have better luck with your next shrimp!


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## MiamiAG (Jan 13, 2004)

Hi everyone. Thank you! for giving me your thoughts.

Copper is an essential element for plants, as are the other metals. As a result, I will continue to dose these. I do know that inverts are very sensitive to copper and, hence, this may be the problem. However, everyone I know that successfully maintains shrimps also doses traces nutrients so I'm not sure.

I am very familiar with Arizona Aquatic Gardens and obtained my first set of shrimp from them. However, a local pet shop carries grass shrimp for 10/$1 so I will let my tank settle a bit and then try those. 

I'll continue to post my experiences. Maybe I should start a post in the algae forum about how to get through algae issues WITHOUT inverts (just like in the old days).


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