shrimp keep dying help!

[nickquinteros]

I've recently lost 3 shrimp over the last week and I can't find a reason for it so I'm looking to see if anyone can give me some advice.

before I start, my parameters

temp 72

ammonia & nitrite 0

nitrate 5

kh 3

gh 8

ph 7.2-7.6

 

shrimp are on eco complete with some java fern, moss, subbwasstertang and anubias

running a dual sponge filter and finnex 24/7

 

so every time I find a dead fish I'll take a look at them and try to find any signs of disease that they could be experiencing. I can't seem to fit any disease to what I'm looking at. the shells all look fine with no holes or white growth and no problems with antennae or legs. I attached some pictures of my most recent loss so hopefully you can see something that I can't. any help is much appreciated! also as you can see she is berried and I'm going to try to remove the eggs and hatch them out. thanks!

 

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[chappy6107]

looks like she was trying to molt.  I see the white flesh peeking through at the base of the carapace/start of the tail.  Is your TDS high or low?  are you remineralizing ro water or using tap?

[nickquinteros]

looks like she was trying to molt.  I see the white flesh peeking through at the base of the carapace/start of the tail.  Is your TDS high or low?  are you remineralizing ro water or using tap?

I'm currently waiting for my tds meter to come in the mail so not sure what my tds is right now. I'm currently using tap water and I add gh booster at every water change (which is 25 percent every week)

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[chappy6107]

2 minutes ago, nickquinteros said:

I'm currently waiting for my tds meter to come in the mail so not sure what my tds is right now. I'm currently using tap water and I add gh booster at every water change (which is 25 percent every week)

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your parameters are not out of wack so it makes me think either your tap water is lacking something nutrient wise or contains something bad you dont want.  This is what happened to me and I had to switch over to remineralized RO water.  How long have you been keeping shrimp and how long has this tank been cycled?

[nickquinteros]

2 minutes ago, chappy6107 said:

your parameters are not out of wack so it makes me think either your tap water is lacking something nutrient wise or contains something bad you dont want.  This is what happened to me and I had to switch over to remineralized RO water.  How long have you been keeping shrimp and how long has this tank been cycled?

I was able to get a water quality report for my town water and couldn't find anything bad other than 0.5 mg/l of copper (i read that my api water conditioner removes heavy metals, correct me if i'm wrong). But all the shrimp in this tank were originally in 20 tall with a few cory's I moved them into their own tank maybe a month ago and the tank was being cycled for 3 weeks before that. I've only been keeping shrimp for a few months now. the other 2 shrimp that died were also berried and did have that white spot showing between their carapace and head so maybe it is a molting issue?

[techsmith]

So a couple of things.

1. If you have imported shrimp you can have deaths.

2. The next thing would be your water.

If you have good stock then I would recommend getting an ro unit and a re-mineralizer.

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[nickquinteros]

1 minute ago, techsmith said:

So a couple of things.

1. If you have imported shrimp you can have deaths.

2. The next thing would be your water.

If you have good stock then I would recommend getting an ro unit and a re-mineralizer.

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I first started with bloody mary shrimp that were USA bred from a breeder in NYC then bought red cherry shrimp from my local fish store, I'm not sure if they import from other countries or from USA breeders. I didn't have any deaths when I added them to my first aquarium.

 

I'm currently saving up for a RO unit but my tanks are in my room and I have no place to plumb the unit other than my basement and I don't want to carry buckets of water up 2 flights of stairs. I plan on moving all my tanks to my basement but that won't be happening until summer maybe fall

[techsmith]

stock seems ok from your last message. I had a horrible time with neos with my water and had to convert to caridina but because I had too soft of water coming out of the tap.

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[nickquinteros]

2 minutes ago, techsmith said:

stock seems ok from your last message. I had a horrible time with neos with my water and had to convert to caridina but because I had too soft of water coming out of the tap.

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according to my town water report, my kh out of the tap can range from 90-600ppm which i believe is 4-over 22 degrees however when i test the water coming out of my tap is generally around 2-6 degrees so it seems pretty good for me in keeping neos. Once i get an RO unit i plan on starting a tank for caridina but I want some more experience with shrimp keeping first

[chappy6107]

31 minutes ago, nickquinteros said:

 But all the shrimp in this tank were originally in 20 tall with a few cory's I moved them into their own tank maybe a month ago and the tank was being cycled for 3 weeks before that. I've only been keeping shrimp for a few months now.

 

It is possible your tank did not cycle long enough, but my bet is what ever wrong is in your water.  Tap is notorious for constantly changing and containing stuff that does not agree with our shrimps.

[nickquinteros]

1 minute ago, chappy6107 said:

 

It is possible your tank did not cycle long enough, but my bet is what ever wrong is in your water.  Tap is notorious for constantly changing and containing stuff that does not agree with our shrimps.

how would my cycle be a reason if it's been over a month? and if it was my tap water wouldn't i have seen deaths when they were in the original 20g tall?

[chappy6107]

1 minute ago, nickquinteros said:

how would my cycle be a reason if it's been over a month? and if it was my tap water wouldn't i have seen deaths when they were in the original 20g tall?

not enough bio film build up.  some cycles take 4 weeks some take 2 months. 

 

if it is you tap water you could be seeing deaths now because of either a build up of unwanted crap in the water source or the municipality has added something to flush the system out.  Most municipalities do this to keep the water healthy for humans, but does not help for shrimp.

[nickquinteros]

2 minutes ago, chappy6107 said:

not enough bio film build up.  some cycles take 4 weeks some take 2 months. 

 

if it is you tap water you could be seeing deaths now because of either a build up of unwanted crap in the water source or the municipality has added something to flush the system out.  Most municipalities do this to keep the water healthy for humans, but does not help for shrimp.

 

makes sense. So what would you recommend for me right now besides using an RODI unit as I said that won't be possible until later this year. 

[afeather]

I actually prefer to wait several months for the tank to mature and settle and allow biofilm to grow in. Several months may be overkill, but I didn't do that for my first tank or two and lost most of my purchased shrimp. Between waiting for my tanks to mature and using an RO unit w/ remineralizer, I haven't had a shrimp death in almost half a year. (at least not one of unnatural causes. they cant escape aging. lol)

[nickquinteros]

I actually prefer to wait several months for the tank to mature and settle and allow biofilm to grow in. Several months may be overkill, but I didn't do that for my first tank or two and lost most of my purchased shrimp. Between waiting for my tanks to mature and using an RO unit w/ remineralizer, I haven't had a shrimp death in almost half a year. (at least not one of unnatural causes. they cant escape aging. lol)

hopefully my remaining shrimp can survive while my tank matures more. there are a lot of new hatched shrimp I'm there right now and all of the eggs that I salvaged from the dead shrimp so hopefully they make it. besides that I still have some shrimp in my 20 tall that were too quick to catch so not all will be lost if this current tank fails. thanks to everyone that helped me out!

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[chappy6107]

1 hour ago, nickquinteros said:

 

makes sense. So what would you recommend for me right now besides using an RODI unit as I said that won't be possible until later this year. 

 

I would slow down on the water changes.(unless you are heavily feeding)  I change ~10% of my water once a week.  If I miss a week, I am not worried.  Shrimp much prefer stability in their tanks. 

[JSak]

3 hours ago, chappy6107 said:

 

I would slow down on the water changes.(unless you are heavily feeding)  I change ~10% of my water once a week.  If I miss a week, I am not worried.  Shrimp much prefer stability in their tanks. 

I agree. I change about 10% - 15% of water once every 3 - 4 weeks. I feed all of them daily, alternating each day with solid food and powdered foods. All of my tanks are shrimp only, so I feel that they don't accumulate waste too much as long as I feed appropriately. Like @chappy6107 said, I believe that shrimp prefer stability over pristine water conditions. As invertebrates, they're very susceptible to changes in the mineral content of the water, so large water changes may be a shock to them if the parameters aren't close to exactly the same. As for cycling, tbh I cycle some of my tanks in 5 - 7 days and my shrimp are breeding and doing very well. I think you said you cycled your tank for a month, so I don't think that's the issue. All but 1 of my tanks run on sponge filters and have at least java moss in them.

 

Another possibility (and what I think you should try first) is that there is chlorine in your tap water. This actually happened to me when I first started shrimp a couple years ago and I couldn't figure out why all my shrimp kept dying. I gave up, but tried again last year and the same thing happened at first. I went online and searched everywhere, but I couldn't really find anything that fit what was happening to my shrimp. They had the horizontal line along their backs where they molt from and they kept dying almost one a day. I finally saw someone mention that chlorine is toxic to shrimp and that sometimes there is chlorine in tap water which is what makes it harder or something so I decided to get Prime and dose it to my water. I saw an immediate change in the activity of the shrimp so the tap water in my town must have a lot of chlorine in it. Currently, I have a tank overrun by RCS. I actually feed these guys twice a day but still only do about a 15% water change once a month. 

 

If I were you, I'd get a small bottle of Prime. Then when you do a water change dose the water you're going to add into the tank first and mix the water so the Prime spreads throughout the water, then add it into the tank. The small bottles of Prime are pretty cheap and accessible, so if the problem is chlorine in your water then it'll be an easy and cheap fix. If this isn't the problem, then doing less water changes may help. Getting a good R/O unit can be a bit pricey. Just my thoughts and my experiences. Hope you get this figured out!

[Shrimple minded]

Good luck with the artificial hatching, you can clearly see eyes on the eggs so likely ready to pop.

[nickquinteros]

I agree. I change about 10% - 15% of water once every 3 - 4 weeks. I feed all of them daily, alternating each day with solid food and powdered foods. All of my tanks are shrimp only, so I feel that they don't accumulate waste too much as long as I feed appropriately. Like [mention=4117]chappy6107[/mention] said, I believe that shrimp prefer stability over pristine water conditions. As invertebrates, they're very susceptible to changes in the mineral content of the water, so large water changes may be a shock to them if the parameters aren't close to exactly the same. As for cycling, tbh I cycle some of my tanks in 5 - 7 days and my shrimp are breeding and doing very well. I think you said you cycled your tank for a month, so I don't think that's the issue. All but 1 of my tanks run on sponge filters and have at least java moss in them.
 
Another possibility (and what I think you should try first) is that there is chlorine in your tap water. This actually happened to me when I first started shrimp a couple years ago and I couldn't figure out why all my shrimp kept dying. I gave up, but tried again last year and the same thing happened at first. I went online and searched everywhere, but I couldn't really find anything that fit what was happening to my shrimp. They had the horizontal line along their backs where they molt from and they kept dying almost one a day. I finally saw someone mention that chlorine is toxic to shrimp and that sometimes there is chlorine in tap water which is what makes it harder or something so I decided to get Prime and dose it to my water. I saw an immediate change in the activity of the shrimp so the tap water in my town must have a lot of chlorine in it. Currently, I have a tank overrun by RCS. I actually feed these guys twice a day but still only do about a 15% water change once a month. 
 
If I were you, I'd get a small bottle of Prime. Then when you do a water change dose the water you're going to add into the tank first and mix the water so the Prime spreads throughout the water, then add it into the tank. The small bottles of Prime are pretty cheap and accessible, so if the problem is chlorine in your water then it'll be an easy and cheap fix. If this isn't the problem, then doing less water changes may help. Getting a good R/O unit can be a bit pricey. Just my thoughts and my experiences. Hope you get this figured out!

I use api water conditioner at every water change but I'm running low and might switch to prime and see what happens and I plan on reducing my water changes too thanks

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[nickquinteros]

Good luck with the artificial hatching, you can clearly see eyes on the eggs so likely ready to pop.

yeah I even saw some tails on some of them so any day now I should have more babies

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[wyzazz]

10 hours ago, nickquinteros said:

yeah I even saw some tails on some of them so any day now I should have more babies

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Good luck!  

[JonRon]

Do not Forget! If you do not have an R/O unit. You can use rain water. I use rain water any Chance I get. However; revert to R/0 when I do not have rain. That is best solution for your Shrimp. I would never use tap water unless filtered with R/O unit. Their are small R/O Units you can find on the Internet that are less the $80. 

[nickquinteros]

just as an update to my current situation. I received my TDS meter in the mail and got a reading of around 400 which is odd because my tap read 220 and my 20 tall is around 300. could be caused by the ecocomplete but i'm not too sure. I'm definitely going to start saving up for a good RODI unit, probably something portable so I can use it in the bathroom so I don't have to bring up buckets of water from the basement. For now I'm skipping this weeks water change and will be reducing the amount changed to about a gallon a week. I lost another shrimp last night in my 20 long and I can't see many other shrimp left, hopefully they're just hiding. The shrimp that are in my 20 tall are all doing really well and I'm already seeing some saddles. As of right now I'm going to let my population increase in the 20 tall and keep an eye on the 20 long and see how the remaining shrimp do.

[chappy6107]

3 hours ago, nickquinteros said:

just as an update to my current situation. I received my TDS meter in the mail and got a reading of around 400 which is odd because my tap read 220 and my 20 tall is around 300. could be caused by the ecocomplete but i'm not too sure. I'm definitely going to start saving up for a good RODI unit, probably something portable so I can use it in the bathroom so I don't have to bring up buckets of water from the basement. For now I'm skipping this weeks water change and will be reducing the amount changed to about a gallon a week. I lost another shrimp last night in my 20 long and I can't see many other shrimp left, hopefully they're just hiding. The shrimp that are in my 20 tall are all doing really well and I'm already seeing some saddles. As of right now I'm going to let my population increase in the 20 tall and keep an eye on the 20 long and see how the remaining shrimp do.

yes eco complete has the ability to store and release minerals and what not.  I have a fish tank with eco complete and it is always higher than every other tank I have.

[MinusInfinity]

Check your tap to see if there is any nitrates in it. 

 

I would not use any conditioners, I would age my tap water so that the chlorine can breathe out. 

 

General rule of thumb, you'd want zero nitrates. The GH in my opinion seems to be a tad high. Generally I'd keep neos between 5-7gh.  Tds around 200-250.