Too soon for shrimps?

[tangyp]

Hello all. I've just recently redone my tank from scratch...threw away all the plants & gravel, gave the tank a thorough wash, put in base fertiliser and new batch of gravel and have re-planted my tank with new plants.

After 4 days, the local fish shop guy told me it was alright to put in algae eating fish and Yamato shrimps. So I put in two SAE and 5 Yamato shrimps. Before that, I tested the water for ammonia & nitrite. Nothing. So far so good, right? PH & KH also seem to be alright. Water temp about 25 degrees.

However, next day, all the shrimps died!! sigh So...is it too soon for me to put in the shrimps? It has now been two weeks. At the first week level, I put in 3 red eye tetras for purposes of cycling the tank. Seems they are quite hardy.

Please advise...have I been doing the right thing so far? At what stage should I add in more fish?

Want to do it right this time round.

Thanks in advance.

[Blue Whale]

I will share from my point of view.

Firstly I think introducing was too early, the water does not have sufficient time in aging.

2ndly, ph might change even though u might have the correct ph and kh from the beginning. Its only right for you observe every 2 days on the ph to see how much does it change and buffer ur kh accordingly. You can say its very situational.
--------
My opinion is wait for 1 more week before introducing new stock, meanwhile u can do your observation from there.

My experience is if fishes were introduced later than the shrimps, you will have higher chance that they dun tekan the shrimps. If you are introducing mountain shrimps or Yamatos, scape it with tall drift wood with water flow on top (submerged rainbow system) so that the shrimps can climb high.

My submerged rainbow system
A oto PTN400 provides good water flow, pipe it with a opposite Z shaped pipe with one end with a stopper and the top of pipe with many holes will give u a good water flow on top. If not, just open the bottom of the CO2 diffuser which allows water flow to come out where the shrimps can congregate. Most fish will not go for this so its a santuary for the shrimps.

[bclee]

[quote:35fa1123f2="tangyp"]Hello all. I've just recently redone my tank from scratch...threw away all the plants & gravel, gave the tank a thorough wash, put in base fertiliser and new batch of gravel and have re-planted my tank with new plants.

After 4 days, the local fish shop guy told me it was alright to put in algae eating fish and Yamato shrimps. So I put in two SAE and 5 Yamato shrimps. Before that, I tested the water for ammonia & nitrite. Nothing. So far so good, right? PH & KH also seem to be alright. Water temp about 25 degrees.

However, next day, all the shrimps died!! sigh So...is it too soon for me to put in the shrimps? It has now been two weeks. At the first week level, I put in 3 red eye tetras for purposes of cycling the tank. Seems they are quite hardy.

Please advise...have I been doing the right thing so far? At what stage should I add in more fish?

Want to do it right this time round.

Thanks in advance.[/quote:35fa1123f2]

Shrimps are sensitive to NH3 and NO2. They are definitely not recommended for newly setup tank.

If you want to be sure use a NO2 test kit. You are safe if NO2 reading is consistently showing zero.

I recommend that you add in fishes slowly. Only add shrimps when your tank is stable maybe >1 month or so.

BC

[tangyp]

Thanks for the comments. Yeah...I thought I might be a little hasty in adding the shrimps. Will let the tank cycle a few more weeks before trying again.

Thanks again.

[hjbyeo]

Hey... that happened to me as well. Cherry / Malayan ... all got the same destiny - Died the very next few hours.

My tank had been cycled for more than a month already. One problem is that I am getting alot more hair algae on my riccia. I need these guys to help me clean.

Their sudden death is not helping our pockets / tank condition.

[prec]

do check out ur tank's no2 content. always take ard 2hrs or so to slowly acclimatise the shrimps. the longer the better. that's what i always do and suffer zilch casualties.

[|squee|]

That's what I do too, I feel that shrimps have to be acclimatised the same way as fish, probably even longer than the usual time. I float my shrimps in the tank for as long as half an hour or so, and i slowly let them out after that.

Also, I noticed that water changes of too large a qantity upsets shrimps. Try to reduce the water you are sucking out, see if it helps.

[shadowfax23]

I used Nutrafin Cycle (contains beneficial bacteria) to speed up the ageing process. and I also used Nutrafin Aqua Plus to remove Cl and heavy metals in the tap water, so far so good.

[Qazwer]

What I'll do is to float the bag of shrimps and scoop a little cup of water from the tank and pour it into the bag and wait for about 10 mins and repeat the process for as long as 1 hr before introducing them into the new environment.

If you the bag gets too much water, pour a little of them out ... but try not to have any of them (live stock) escaping.

I feel that this way is better cos you are actually also tuning the PH, KH and other elements in the bag of shrimps to those in your tank.

Leslie.

[Encriptic]

i guess im the first to be able to achieve this. I introduced like 5 malayan and 1 yamato to test the water. My tank was only 3 days old when i first let them in. but my tank water was from my old tank, when i changed water i just filled the water into this shrimp tank. i added some mulm in also. no casualty so far, and its been about 1 week+. Moss all growing nicely, shrimp still happy. never test for NO2 or whatever, i just test straight with shrimp.

[PeterGwee]

Folks need to know that planted tanks go through "silent" nitrogen cycles if done correctly unlike fish-only tanks. What is different from an old established tank an a new tank is basically mulm (bacteria/organic stuff) both in the filter and substrate area. So? Add them then...Plant the tank heavily with fast growers and dose nutrients for the plants to kick off to a flying start. When the plants needs are being taken care of, the NH3 will never get to the critters. Healthy plants equals to healthy critters.

Regards
Peter Gwee

[prec]

i've done it before too. dumping in 5 cherries into my tank w/o even acclimising them and guess what? they're even breeding now.

just in order to get them less stress up, follow the usual routine.

temp < 28deg
kH < 3
pH ~6.7
All ammonia, nitrate levels are to be kept to the bare minimum or 0
freaking lots of mosses
moerate lighting
feed them please...