# Walstad cherry shrimp bowl



## abak

Hi folks I'm new here allthough I've been lurking around the forum reading up on the natural planted tanks for about two months. Just wanted to share my Walstad experiment. Thanks a bunch for Diana for sharing all her knowledge about her methods! I don't think I would have been able to keep any live plants if I hadn't found her book! This bowl was inspired by her article on bowls for pet shrimp  the best tank I've ever had so far!

It's about a 2 gallon bowl from the crafts department in Walmart. About 1 inch of earth gro soil with a 1/2 inch sand cap. Plants are some ludwigia, crypts, micro sword, hornwort, and Christmas moss and anubias nana on driftwood. I had a moss ball in there too at first but then removed it when I added the pannywort, ludwigia, and moneywort. For floaters I have frogbit and duckweed.
I just put in a tiny 5 watt heater in there yesterday. Will keep it in there for the winter since the temps where dropping to 67 at night I didn't like that. 
It's home to 7 red cherry shrimp and a ramshorn snail that already laid a bunch of eggs. I don't mind the eggs tho as this snail is a cool color and I wouldn't mind more like it  

Here it is at a little over two weeks since setup.


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## Michael

The bowl looks great! You really don't need the heater--red cherry shrimp do very well in cooler temperatures.


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## s2man

Very nice.


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## Newt

I really like it!
Great job.


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## abak

Thanks guys. I tried to upload a picture of the first day of this bowl but my phone is messing up. Will have to try to figure it out later.

Michael I agree on the heater! I ended up taking it out since I had two casualties after putting it in! It warmed the bowl up to 76f over the night and two of my Sakura red shrimps passed away! There where fine until then so I'm pretty sure it's the sudden change in temperature since it's the only change.

What's the deal with that anyway? They were the only ones that where Sakura grade in there too. The rest of my cherries are fine but they are just regular cherry grade and I got them as tiny juveniles unlike the Sakura ones that came in larger adult looking size. Too much inbreeding?? I'm new to shrimps so i have no idea. Anyway I ordered some more shrimps cuz I think they were my last females and I'm down to 5 now I really wanted them to breed so I can add some to my other tanks. 

Well lesson learned! If all looks fine then leave it alone!


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## abak

Does anyone happen to know if they reproduce at lower temperatures around 65-70??


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## abak

Finally uploaded the picture from the startup day. So here is day one.


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## abak

And today. Almost three weeks in. The hornwort has grown a lot. The pennywort has reached the surface and the anubia nano grew a new leaf this week and the little bit of green hair algae I had seems to have stopped growing. So hopefully it means it's all settling down and balancing out! I've started to see a lot of pearling the last two days as well. And the shrimps are a really nice red color  

The big stem plants that are not in the first picture where added about three days later.

I must say I enjoy this bowl more then my 6 gallon guppy tank


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## dwalstad

Very nice!!


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## abak

Thank you


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## Metzengerstein

Looks awesome


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## s2man

Looks great.


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## abak

Thanks guys  I'm not good at plant scaping but I kinda like the jungly mess


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## Michael

abak said:


> Thanks guys  I'm not good at plant scaping but I kinda like the jungly mess


Don't worry about that! It is your tank, you paid for it, you take care of it, you must look at it. As long as it pleases you, it is good.


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## Bbroush

abak said:


> Does anyone happen to know if they reproduce at lower temperatures around 65-70??


I've asked this question on shrimp spot and the consensus I heard was 68 during the day is the lower limit and you'll see less breeding than if you had the temp higher


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## abak

Thank you Bbroush that's good to know! I guess I should have posted that question there or looked it up there  my bowl has been in the 70-74 range lately so I think I'm good then.

Update, I got a new shipment of cherry shrimp yesterday. I added what looked like two males and two females to the bowl and the rest went into my 6 gallon tank. They are only 1/4 to 1/2 inch and It's hard to tell their sex when they are that small! Except for one of them that looks like an already adult male. But now that I look at my old ones and I'm pretty sure they are almost adult size now as they are much bigger then these new ones. And Now that I have an actual male to compare them too I think I had all females in there before lol im such a newb with these guys! But I'm starting to see what looks like ovaries in one of them! I'm so excited! I've been waiting for these guys to grow up for aver a month now! Hopefully I get some babies in the near feature!

Another thing I noticed is the shrimp in the 6 gal are a lot more active then the ones in the bowl. I don't know if it's because I have a heater keeping it at a steady 75 degrees or because it has some water flow. Or because there are other fish in there maybe. Either way they look happy


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## s2man

Man, I have the bug for a nano shrimp tank, now. I have spent the afternoon reading up on shrimp. I know that when I get obsessed like this, it won't end until I reach my goal. I'll have to take my wife to Hobby Lobby for 'her hobbies' and see what I can find. Making your wife happy is always a great excuse indulging your own hobby.


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## abak

I know what you mean! It's an addicting hobby


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## abak

This bowl turned one month on the first  I've removed tons of frogbit and duckweed during the month. And I had to remove all but a tiny piece of hornwort a few days ago. It got too big and was blocking a lot of light for the rest of the plants. 
All the shrimp seem to be doing good so far. I got them all as regular cherry grade but they all developed a pretty nice deep red color like the Sakuras. Can't complain


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## Bbroush

abak said:


> This bowl turned one month on the first  I've removed tons of frogbit and duckweed during the month. And I had to remove all but a tiny piece of hornwort a few days ago. It got too big and was blocking a lot of light for the rest of the plants.
> 
> All the shrimp seem to be doing good so far. I got them all as regular cherry grade but they all developed a pretty nice deep red color like the Sakuras. Can't complain


I've had the same problem! I also had frogbit and the roots went all the way into the soil. Mine is due for a major trimming but I have baby shrimp and I'm worried to disturb them :/


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## abak

When my frogbit roots start getting too long i usually just stick those into my bigger tank. for some reason it doesn't grow as well in that tank tho. But my guppies do like to pick on the roots..
I'm hoping to get rid of the floaters once the pennywort and ludwigia start growing emergent. They are finally starting to break the surface instead of growing around the bowl submersed. I'm pretty excited


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## Bbroush

abak said:


> When my frogbit roots start getting too long i usually just stick those into my bigger tank. for some reason it doesn't grow as well in that tank tho. But my guppies do like to pick on the roots..
> I'm hoping to get rid of the floaters once the pennywort and ludwigia start growing emergent. They are finally starting to break the surface instead of growing around the bowl submersed. I'm pretty excited


Awesome! Yeah I do the same and my flagfish trim them all down


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## abak

Figured I will post a two month picture of the shrimp bowl. Unfortunately I'm going to have to take it down in about a month due to moving. I'm hoping to save the plants and shrimp and use it to start a new 29 gallon tank at the new place. If my SO lets me get another tank  if not then I'm gonna stick with my 7 gallon bow front for now. This was a cool experiment tho and I'm definitely making the new tank Walstad as well!


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## abak

Just another pic from the top. Love how it looks


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## s2man

Looks great, abak.


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## abak

Thanks


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## udbhav

Started my planted aquarium journey yesterday with a 1 gallon small planted tank for a shrimp, following the guidance on Diana Walstad's website! Been reading "Ecology of the Planted Aquarium" and many of the very helpful posts on this forum to prepare to start a 20 gallon tank, and figured the shrimp bowl would be a good place to learn and experiment. Any input, suggestions or advice would be much appreciated.

I used "GardenScape All-Purpose Potting Soil" I found at my local flower shop, ingredients listed on the back were: Organic Compost, Peat Humus, Sand, Composted and Aged Softwood Bark Fines, and Perlite. I added water, skimmed off the perlite, put about an inch down in a gallon glass jar I had. Then I planted Sagittaria subulata, Hydrocotyle leucocephala, Anubias barteri, and a Cryptocorene I picked up at my local pet store, added an inch of play sand, then added conditioned water and 4-5 Malaysian Trumpet Snails. I'm in Brooklyn, and my water is quite soft, I got a KH and GH of 2, so I'm planning on following Diana Walstad's "Increasing Water Hardness Recipe" once I get materials in a couple of days. 1 day later, my readings (best I can tell with my test strips) are a pH of 7, 0 ppm Ammonia, 0 ppm Nitrite, 5 ppm Nitrate, and a water temp of 76F during the day, day 2: pH of 6.6, 0 ppm Ammonia, 5 ppm Nitrite, 40 ppm Nitrate. Wondering if the nitrites that showed up on day 2 are from incomplete nitrification, or coming from manure that's part of the organic compost. Should I wait it out to see if it comes down or change out the water?

Been mineralizing a couple bags of the potting soil to prep for the 20 gallon, excited for what's to come! Apologies if I should be starting a new thread, seemed like it would be helpful to add my experience to this existing one.


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## dwalstad

Good luck with your project. Looks promising.
You wrote: "Wondering if the nitrites that showed up on day 2 are from incomplete nitrification, or coming from manure that's part of the organic compost. Should I wait it out to see if it comes down or change out the water?"

The nitrites probably came from the soil. (There's plenty of nitrification going on in bagged soils before they are ever put into the tank.) I would change the water for sure.


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## udbhav

Thank you for the advice and your wonderful book! Over the last 6 days, I've been testing levels daily, and have changed the water whenever ammonia or nitrite levels seem high, have done 3 water changes so far. Things have settled down a bit, latest readings were 6.4 pH, 0.25 ppm Ammonia , 2 ppm Nitrite, 5 ppm Nitrate. I'm not sure if my ammonia test is giving me readings for combined ammonia and ammonium or just the ammonia, it's the API test. The slash in the label "NH3/NH4+" is a little ambiguous, I could interpret it to mean it's giving me the ratio, or giving me a combined figure.

If it's combined, and I'm understanding the relationship between pH and the ratio of ammonia to ammonium outlined in Ecology of the Planted Aquarium (10x increase in percentage of ammonia to ammonium for every unit increase in pH, with a pH of 7 having 0.33% ammonia), the percent ammonia from my combined 0.25ppm reading is ~ < 0.1%, or less than 0.00025ppm which is a very different reading than 0.25ppm.

I'm also wondering if there's some kind of threshold for ammonia and nitrite that should trigger a water change, or how much I should leave things be and let the bacteria do their thing.


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## dwalstad

I hope your plants are growing. That's critical to bringing the ammonia and nitrites down.
Aquarium test kits measure NH3 plus NH4+ 
I would use your own judgement on when to do a water change.


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## udbhav

Yes my plants are growing, and my readings are trending in the right direction  Thanks for confirmation on the ammonia test.


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## ElNaturalPurist

My kids' mom wants something like this for Mother's Day and I'm wondering what kind of light you're using there?


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## dwalstad

I used a desk lamp for my bowl. A sunny window might also work.


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## jatcar95

ElNaturalPurist said:


> My kids' mom wants something like this for Mother's Day and I'm wondering what kind of light you're using there?


I set up a small bowl for my dad for his birthday last year, I used a $5 desk lamp from Target and a regular LED bulb for a home. It grew great with the lamp, but when I visited last he wasn't even using the lamp, the bowl was just sitting in some ambient sunlight and growing fine.


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## FernKing

Michael said:


> The bowl looks great! You really don't need the heater--red cherry shrimp do very well in cooler temperatures.


I keep hearing that cherry shrimp need temps above 80F degrees to breed. Is that true from anyone’s experience in keeping planted tanks here?


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## mistergreen

FernKing said:


> I keep hearing that cherry shrimp need temps above 80F degrees to breed. Is that true from anyone’s experience in keeping planted tanks here?


No, you can keep them 50F-90F.


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## FernKing

mistergreen said:


> No, you can keep them 50F-90F.


But does anyone have experience with them breeding below 80F degrees?


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## mistergreen

FernKing said:


> But does anyone have experience with them breeding below 80F degrees?


yes, all the time. They stop breeding around 65F, I think.


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## FernKing

mistergreen said:


> yes, all the time. They stop breeding around 65F, I think.


I’m finding that the advice from other aquaium forums isn’t reliable 😂
”Planted Tanks” with dirt seem to have healthier plants and animals and break the “rules“ I see elsewhere. For example I keep reading that “nerite snails live only one year” but people with planted tanks that have bacteria and algae to for them to eat have their nerite snails live for years and years. I was wondering when I kept reading the “Cherry shrimp can only reproduce above 80F degrees” and wondering if there was something else going on. . .


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## dwalstad

Fake news...


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## FernKing

dwalstad said:


> Fake news...


Good to hear! 😂


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## erose

FernKing said:


> But does anyone have experience with them breeding below 80F degrees?


My tank heater is set at 72° and my shrimp breed like crazy.


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## FernKing

erose said:


> My tank heater is set at 72° and my shrimp breed like crazy.


Thanks! I‘m not planning on a tank heater then


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