# Almond Leaves as food?



## Varig8 (Dec 25, 2007)

Currently I have 5 shrimp tanks, 1. CRS & Bees,2. Cobalts & Minamis & Cherries,3. Minamis & Amanos, 4. Amanos, 5. Sulawesi. I purchased an RO/DI system after having difficulty with some of my water parameter 'problems' and continually loosing shrimp. (This seemed to do the trick for other hobbyists out there with water parameter problems and I recommend having one!). I use Tropical Almond leaves (Ketapang, Cattapa,etc.) in my RO/DI water storage tank which I age for 1 week, each week, for my weekly 15%-20% water changes. I also place one medium size leaf in each tank about every 2-3 weeks. I feed store bought foods and fresh vegs. (Biomax CRS food, Spirulina pellets, Sun Chlorella tabs,Tetra Flake, Shrimp pellets, algae wafers, Fresh spinach & Zucchini, Frozen Bloodworms & Brine Shrimp. I vary the feed mix daily. No matter what I put in the tank to feed them, they nibble for a few seconds on whatever food is there with little interest. They constantly feed on the Almond leaf until it is only the skeletal remain. It seems they are constantly congregating and feeding on this leaf with little interest in the prepared foods. This isnt a problem for me and Im not complaining as the leaves are free from my yard and the price is right! Im really wondering what nutritional value these leaves have as I assume the majority of their diet is coming from the Almond leaf. I know that they are also consuming the bacteria that breaks down the leaf tissue and can be beneficial. From what I have observed, I would say that 90%+ of their diet is Almond Leaf. Most of my tanks have been set up for over 8 months or more, 1 only about 6 weeks. Also I am wondering why Almond Leaf isnt mentioned as a food item in the majority of the postings concerning shrimp food? I would think that as beneficial as it seems to be, that it would be a #1 "ingredient" for keeping shrimp? I suppose my real question is; Is this a suitable and healthy diet for shrimp? Maybe I can just stop buying prepared food as they seem to ignore most of it anyway? I look forward to other hobbyists comments and information about this.


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## FobbyBobby23 (Mar 8, 2005)

I personally think almond leaves are a gimmick (as in, don't go out of your way to get them but if its free go for it!). The shrimp are eating stuff that is growing on the leaves, like you said, but in the process they rip up the leaves. In addition, if you just left the leaf in water by itself, it'd eventually look as though shrimp went through and shredded it anyways.

I'd imagine that even if all you fed them were the almond leaves, that they would be okay. The shrimp's diet is composed mostly of algae/microorganisms in the wild (haha there aren't people around to feed them expensive food!), so it should be fine if they're just feasting on the almond leaves cause they get the microorganisms/the algae/and all that fine cellulose and such and proteins and stuff found in the leaves.



I also just saw this, :icon_hang, must be new! hahah unrelated to post though.


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## dgphelps (Jan 1, 2008)

I drop a leaf in my tank every week or so. I've found they also love cherry and peach tree leaves. To do this, I take a nice dry and ready to crumble leaf and soak it in some old tank water for a week or more. I have a small glass vase I keep old tank water in with floating plants like frogbit or mini water lettuce. Every week when I change the tank water I dump all the old water out of the vase and refill it.

Then when the leaf in the tank is gone, or when I think about it I dump a new one in. The shrimp and snails love it. However, my shrimp will go to a piece of spinach that has been boiled for about 3 minutes over a leaf any day. They also LOVE Hikari crab bites.


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