# Copper Proteinate dangerous to shrimps?



## Scipio (Feb 18, 2008)

I just bought small container of New Life SPECTRUM Cichlid Formula 1mm sinking pellets for my galaxy rasboras and cardinal tetras. I failed to see that it contains Copper Proteinate before buying it and just found out after I opened it 

The ingredient is way at the bottom, 29th and fifth to last. Will it be enough to kill my shrimps if they eat it? I like to feed my fish several different foods and I noticed that the ingredients are really good on this product but like I said I failed to noticed the copper proteinate at the bottom of the list.


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## JohnPaul (Aug 28, 2006)

Is it dangerous to shrimps? Yes.

Now, if you ask *how* dangerous, that's another question. And one you'll get lots of different answers to. If your primary concern in that tank is the shrimp, I'd avoid any food that uses a copper-based preservative even in tiny amounts. Copper is toxic to shrimp and it bioaccumulates. What that means is, it's not like if one piece of this food goes in the tank the shrimp are going to start having seizures and dropping. Even if they are eating the food regularly, they will probably be fine for 3 months, 6 months, 9 months...who knows. But then one day, you're going to come back to these forums and start a thread saying, "My shrimp are dying for no reason! I checked my water parameters and they're perfectly fine!"

Now, that actually may or may not happen. If most of the food is eaten by your fish, and eaten quickly, then it could be that the shrimp uptake copper so slowly that they naturally live out their lifespan (which, let's face it, is rather short) before they've bioaccumulated enough copper to be toxic. So you potentially _could_ use it safely, I suppose. But at the very least, you're taking a big risk.


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