Sylvester

That's probably correct regarding their nutrition. For what it's worth, I don't (currently) feed my shrimp. There's enough algae in the tank for them. Once I get to the point where I don't have to clean the tank every week, then I might start giving them some food.

I had my first neocaridina shrimplets a month ago, and since then I've been monitoring them closely. At the time, I'd looked everywhere to try to get information on, a] the size of shrimplets at birth and, b] how quickly they grow. I couldn't find anything more accurate than "really small" and "quite quickly". Well, I now know so I thought that I'd document it in case anybody else is interested. At birth, they are 1mm-2mm After one week, they are 2-3mm After two weeks, they are 3-4mm After three weeks, they are 4-5mm After four weeks, they are 5-6mm So, I feel reasonably confident in saying that they grow (roughly) 1mm a week - at least for the first month.

Maybe originally ... but mine are from Derbyshire, England. You can tell, they swim with a Derbyshire accent.

My most recent water parameters were: Temp: 25C Light Hours per Day: 12 CL2: 0.4 NO2: 0 NO3: 5 pH: 8.0 GH: 20 KH: 17 TDS: 350 As you can see, my water is VERY hard and it's quite a high pH, but there isn't much that I can do about that. It means that I'm limited to neocaridina because I don't think that any of the more exotic species of shrimp will survive in my water. I do a 25% water change every week. The water is plain old tap water, treated with tap safe, and I let it stand for 48h. I do that water change slowly - 15mins to syphon water out of the tank and then another 15-mins to syphon new water into the tank. My (blue dream) neocaridina seem to be happy with this approach, and I've just had my first offspring - three months after starting the tank and two months after adding the shrimp. I don't feed them anything! The algae in the tank sustains them. I did try feeding them blanched cucumber, just to see what would happen, and they LOVED it. But, I want them to earn their keep, so they have to eat what nature provides.

Congrats. I'm still learning with my neocaridina, but I'm hoping that in a few months I might be experienced enough to have a go at some more 'exotic' shrimp.

I thought that maybe some absolute beginners might be interested in my experience of cycling an entirely new tank. My experience was that the cycle kicked in at week-4 and by week-5 was established. I should stress that I started the tank 100% from scratch. I didn't have another tank from which I could pull any 'starter' material. The tank was 12l with a Maxi Power Head Pump (6W, 400L/hr) and a 25w heater. It also had a ceramic filter, carbon filter and 5.75w light, all of which came with the kit. My base-layer was Tropica Plant Growth Substrate covered by 'Pets At Home' Premium Black Gravel. Into this base I placed five plants; Cryptocoryne Amicorum, Cryptocoryne Nevellii, Echinodorus Parviflorus Tropica, Hygrophila Mini and Java Moss (on wood). I then added POTW (plain old tap water) treated with 'Love Fish' Tap Safe and switched everything on. After one week, I did a water test: CL2 – 0 pH – 8 KH -15-20 (d) GH – >21 (d) NO2 – 5 (mg/l) NO3 – 25 (mg/l) I was actually surprised that the nitrite and nitrate levels were relatively low, but clearly, the nitrogen cycle hadn't kicked in. At the end of the second week I did another water test before doing a 25% water change: CL2 – 0.8 (up) pH – 8 (no change) KH -15-20 (no change) GH – >21 (no change) NO2 – 5 (no change) NO3 – 50 (up) I was a little surprised by the increase in CL2, but everything else was as expected. I think that the increase in Nitrate was probably because the cryptocorynes were both suffering from 'melt' and I suspect that as the leaves decayed they were releasing nitrates into the water. At the end of the third week I did another water test before a 25%b water change: CL2 – 0.4 (down) pH – 7.6-8 (no significant change) KH -15-20 (no change) GH – >21 (no change) NO2 – 0-0.5 (down) NO3 – 10 (down) It seemed as if the nitrogen cycle was now starting to kick-in because the numbers were starting to come down. At the end of the fourth week I did another water test before a 25% water change: CL2 – 0 (steady) pH – 8-8.4 (up) KH -20 (up) GH – >21 (no change) NO2 – 0 (steady) NO3 – 0 (down) So, at that time I made the assumption that the nitrogen cycle was operating. Since then, I've continued to monitor the water quality on a weekly basis. I keep the tank at 25C and have the light on for 12h per day. I swap out ~25%-30% of the water every week using a narrow tube. It typically takes 15-20 minutes to syphon 25%-30% of the water out of the tank (during which time I do some general tank cleaning) and another 15-20 minutes to syphon fresh (tap) water back into the tank. My neocaridina seem happy with this approach, and it was roughly 2 months after adding juvenile shrimp to the tank that I spotted my first 'berried' female.

I first spotted the berried shrimp on April 6 and she was very visible for a couple of days. Every time I looked at the tank, I could see her cruising around. But then, on April 8, she was gone. I didn't know what had happened but my hope was that the shrimplets had hatched and the reason that I could no long see a berried shrimp was because she was no longer berried. I did spend time scouring the tank with a magnifying glass, but there was no sign of any shrimplets. Then yesterday. YAY! I spotted my first shrimplet. In fact, I spotted three! I'm assuming that if I can see three there's probably at least another three hiding in the undergrowth somewhere. Conveniently, one of the shrimplets was on the glass of the tank so I was able to measure that he/she was 3mm from head to toe which is a useful piece of data since I know with reasonable accuracy that he/she is around two weeks old. I managed to snap one (very fuzzy) photograph of one of the babies on some Java Moss which gives a good idea of how small he/she is. I know that the photo isn't great, but it's taken with a six year old pocket camera. He/she is right in the middle of the image horizontally and about two thirds down vertically. Unfortunately, I also don’t have any of the magic image processing software that they use on CSI to make fuzzy images miraculously clear, but I was able to crop the image to make the baby a little more visible.

Yes. My idea was to try to change NOTHING. That's what I meant by careful monitoring and managing. One thing that's a little strange, the eggs have little eyes which I understand indicates that they're close to hatching. But, this is the first time that I've noticed any berried shrimp in my tank. This, despite the fact that the tank is sitting on my desk and I look at it dozens of times a day.

Yay! I checked my tank this morning, and saw this. My first shrimp were installed on February 11th, 2016. So, in just under two months I've got my first pregnant neocaridina. Now, I just hope that some of the offspring actually survive. I'm going to be especially careful monitoring and managing the tank over the next few weeks.

Wow! The TDS of water out of the tap in Brooklyn is 40-50.

Town: Sunderland Country: UK Tapwater TDS: 300

I thought that it might be interesting to know how different tapwater TDS is from place to place. I'll start: Town: Chorleywood Country: UK Tapwater TDS: 350-375

Thanks. According to the supplier, they're Blue Dream, but I know that there are LOTS of different names used. I'm enjoying these little guys so much. I'm hoping to learn with the neocaridina and then 'graduate' to Crystal Bee sometime in the future.

Not yet ... but I've already got some filter material ready. The shrimp are still juvenile, and I don't expect any shrimplets for at least a couple of months.

Hi everybody. I'm new to the whole 'shrimp thing', but rapidly becoming a convert. I live in a small town just outside of London (towards the end of the Metropolitan subway/tube line). I set up a nano (12 litre) aquarium back in mid-January, which is starting to mature nicely. I've been keeping a blog of progress at https://timaroli.wordpress.com/.