Stef & Darkcobra's Maiden Shrimp Voyage

[Art by Stef*]

I prefer to think of them as "pumpkin seeds", lol.

 

There are 2 other girls that are larger MIA-hiding.

The females appeared to "have much back" this week, but I didn't see any actual eggs.

So, this morning, one comes out, looks at me, spins around and starts "fluffing" and flaunting her eggs.

She keeps dropping an egg? Is this normal? The other girl got a handle, but she's not as loaded down.

How long before the pumpkin seeds pop?

 

-Stef*

[mosspearl]

Nice berries there, Stef. Good luck with the babies!

[Art by Stef*]

Thank you, Toni!

I'm enjoying the lovely lady lumps.

 

-Stef*

[Darkcobra]

So, we had our first crisis.

 

Stef noticed one day the shrimp weren't acting with normal vigor.  Then the next, she noticed that no water was flowing from the HOB.

 

I grabbed my standard HOB diagnostic tool - a large neodymium supermagnet.  Holding it up to the motor, you can feel the magnet vibrate in your hand if it's receiving power and not burnt out.  Which it did.  So next I moved it around the motor, this moves the impeller, usually allowing one to unstick it without opening it up.  Which it also did, producing the chatter of a dry impeller.  It was quickly unplugged.

 

I took off the top and found the inside of the HOB completely dry.  No idea how that happened, how long it had been that way, or whether the bacteria in the media was still viable.  At least the sponge prefilter was still submersed, but without flow through it, there might have been some die-off there too.  Time for tests:

 

Ammonia: 2ppm

Nitrite: 0ppm

Nitrate: Too high to distinguish (a separate issue, we'll deal with that later)

pH: 6.1

 

Ok, so there's ammonia, but at least it's in non-toxic form due to the pH.  Which gives us some leeway.  Strategy time.  Normally I'm the water parameter/chemistry guy, but this time around, Stef knew enough to contribute heavily to this.  I'm proud of her!

 

Water changes were, for the moment, out of the question.  A large enough change to get most of the ammonia out could be a shock to the shrimp.  A smaller water change could raise pH to where the remaining ammonia became toxic.  Instead, we attacked it from a few different angles:

 

1) Restarted the HOB, swapping about 2/3rds of the ceramic biomedia with that from another tank.

2) Loaded 80% of the surface area with water lettuce, and replaced the dim LED light with a 23W 6500K CFL.

3) Added a small bit of Tetra SafeStart+, left over from originally cycling the tank.

4) Topped off the tank with distilled water to dilute ammonia slightly, with no change to pH.

 

I suspected that CO2 buildup might be responsible for part of the low pH, and that some of the actions we were taking would deplete it and raise the pH.  I outgassed a water sample and it tested 6.6 pH, so it appeared we'd still be safe.

 

Not long ago [soothing Shrimp] had an ammonia issue as well, I speculated AmmoCarb might get him out of the fix, and by his report it did.  Ironic we were now in a similar situation, we both had a laugh over that!  We weren't sure if our "natural" approach would work, and didn't want to be caught flat-footed in the middle of the night, so we went to the store and bought a carton.  But didn't use it immediately, we just wanted on hand as a backup plan for this or future issues.

 

To make the rest of the story short...  pH rose to no more than 6.4.  Ammonia dropped steadily at about 0.5ppm per day.  Nitrite never appeared (SafeStart+ has produced that odd effect every time I've used it).  We've now been back to normal for a few days.

 

We haven't been able to count more than six shrimp at the same time since this all began, but with the tank so heavily planted, we don't know if we lost any or if they're just hiding.  Still at least one heavily berried.

 

There was one known shrimp death a few days before all this, a male, and it was promptly removed.  Not sure if it was in any way related.  It had been looking funny for a while.  Perhaps a molting issue?

 

We're going to step up water change frequency a bit to try to deal with the nitrates, but I'm considering a regenerable nitrate adsorbant as well.  I'm about to mix up a new batch of remineralized water, with a bit more mineral content this time in case it was too lean.  And we're keeping a close eye on that HOB.

[Soothing Shrimp]

Great report, darkcobra and a nice post to refer to if someone else finds themselves in that predicament!  Thanks for taking the time to write all that up!

[Darkcobra]

Great report, darkcobra and a nice post to refer to if someone else finds themselves in that predicament!  Thanks for taking the time to write all that up!

 

Thanks!  Figured it would be worth a writeup.

 

Some good news too, today we removed the temporary plants.  And found ten shrimp total, including three berried females.  So no losses except that one male we knew about.  Keeping fingers crossed, can't wait for babies!

 

[Soothing Shrimp]

Provided all hatch, you are looking 60+ shrimplets.  Not a bad number to start with.

[Art by Stef*]

So peaceful.

HA!

Nerve-wracking is what it is.

I did a water change, and Darkcobra is looking into slowing nitrate accumulation procedures.

(Poor man woke up and was pulling chemicals out of his aquarium cache before he even got to drink his coffee.

Said he was brainstorming in a dream? Kinda scary.)

 

I hope they don't molt, or drop eggs or something.

Another question.

I don't know if you can see it or not, but the berried female on the far left seems to be getting a white head?

Is this a battle scar from the crisis?

What does it indicate?

 

The male(?) we lost before the incident was a delightful opaque shade of orange-unlike the others, which are more transparent.

It was always that way from the get-go, and being a newbie I was going to cull for that color, but find it could be an indicator of some problem? I hope the berried female isn't going that route, but it's not really opaque orange as it is turning white.

 

-Stef*

[Soothing Shrimp]

Turning white/clearish is usually a sign of stress.  Sometimes fems will lose some color while while berried and regainit when gaining strength back.

 

The "white" color people refer to when talking about bacterial infections are in the body.  The body can actually turn white (paper white) opaque because the bacteria is causing dead tissue in the body.  Doesn't look as if any of your have that.

 

I'm also trying to breed for solid pigment, but it will take lots of time. Been working on my yellow strain for years to do the same thing, but still not there yet. 

[Darkcobra]

A little message from one of the many new members of our household.

 

[Soothing Shrimp]

As I wrote in my card to my mom when I was in elementary school: Happy V-D Day.

[Darkcobra]

LOL, what a difference that one redundant letter makes!

 

Stef said she'd been planning to trim the depicted moss.  Well that ain't gonna happen for a while now, with all the little shrimp babies hiding in it!  No idea how many there are.  They're SUPER tiny.  I only started seeing them after I got a bright LED flashlight and left nose prints on the glass.

 

Other updates.  I'm going encourage Stef to stay on my weekly tank maintenance schedule, with 10% WC weekly in the shrimp tank until nitrates are more reasonable.  I prefer they stay below 40ppm.  Have also added a little sachet of maybe 2-3 tbsp. Purigen to the HOB to adsorb organic wastes before they can be converted to nitrates.

 

We used to transfer a bit of tank water from a larger tank with each WC to introduce a more complex nutrient profile than my reconstituted RO.  Don't think that's necessary anymore, the shrimp tank is now well mulmed.  Plus have been experimenting with a new chemical algae treatment technique in most large tanks, something different from my One-Two Punch.  Probably harmless to shrimp but I don't want to risk it, so that's another reason for no more water transfers.

 

I do worry however that the plants may be competing with shrimp for Ca/Mg.  I still lack a GH test kit to verify, but I've seen evidence in other tanks that plant consumption is higher than I thought.  So I've beefed up the RO reconstitution recipe:

 

1 gallon distilled/RO water
1/16 tsp. (1 pinch) CaSO4.2H2O (12ppm Ca, 1.66dGH)
1/16 tsp. (1 pinch) tricalcium citrate (12ppm Ca, 1.66dGH)
1/16 tsp. (1 pinch) CaCl2.2H2O (16ppm Ca, 2.26dGH)
1/16 tsp. (1 pinch) MgSO4.7H2O (12ppm Mg, 2.85dGH)
1/64 tsp. (1 drop) K2SO4
1/64 tsp. heaping (1 drop) baking soda
1 drop dilute iodine solution (as originally described)

 

Which almost doubles Ca/Mg.  Plus adds a bit of Na/CO3 which was previously entering through water transfers.  And a little Cl too.  I'll be watching pH as this new water is gradually introduced.  Don't want to raise KH too much, slightly acidic water will be a help if we ever have an ammonia issue again.

 

Time to mix another kind of recipe, in the kitchen this time.  This was supposed to be Valentine's Day dinner, but we were, um... occupied.  Just for kicks I thought I'd share:

 

1 lb. steak
2 tbsp beef broth
2 tbsp Lea & Perrins Worcestshire Sauce
1/2 tsp Colgin's liquid smoke, hickory
1/2 tsp lime juice
1 tsp Poloku (oriental Shiitake mushroom extract)
1/2 tsp MSG
1 tbsp Cavender's Greek Seasoning
1 tsp Dale's Steak Marinade

 

Jaccard the steaks.  Place in a Ziploc with the rest of the mixed ingredients, press out air and seal.  Sous-vide for about 2 hours at 132°F.  Move bag into cold water while starting a very hot grill with Kingsford Competition Charcoal.  Remove steaks and dry.  Sear quickly, painting each side of the steaks with beurre noisette (browned butter), and throwing a few dry hickory wood chips onto the coals.  Serve with remaining beurre noisette drizzled over the steaks, plus a salad and baked (or stuffed) potato.

 

Been working on that marinade for a while.  Greatly enhances the meat flavor without making it taste like any seasoning in particular.  My mad scientist tendencies run amuck with with pretty much everything.

[Soothing Shrimp]

LOL  So you needed an LED flashlight to see your noseprints, eh?  No wonder you were occupied.  You were cleaning off the prints on the glass. :-p j/k

 

I picked up some new words with cooking from your recepie.  I think I'll put them back down.  They are too fancy for me. heh

 

So withyour RO remin recipie, where does that put gh and TDS, and is that for 1 gallon?

[Darkcobra]

Yep, for 1G water.  8.43dGH and 1dKH (both computed), and 196 TDS (measured).

[Soothing Shrimp]

Pretty sweet.  After my SSgh/kh runs out, I may have to try my own remin.

[Darkcobra]

Would be interesting to see how it compares to a commercial product, since I haven't used one I can't say, I only know the shrimp are alive and breeding.  If you decide to give DIY remin a trial before fully committing to it, let me know.  I'd be happy to send you samples of any components you don't have, the quantities needed are so small I wouldn't miss enough to do 50G of remin water, maybe more.

[Soothing Shrimp]

Coolish.  Yeah, Ijust may do that.  I just opened a new jar of SS gh/kh, so it may take a year or so until I'm able to try a new remin....unless I decide to experiement with a single tank.  I just bought 2 new tenners yesterday....hmmmmmmm

[Art by Stef*]

Today is my birthday (and John Travoltas')!

 

Went to a SELAS (Southeast Louisiana Aquarium Society) social on Sunday, and my friend hooked me up with some CRS.

I am so excited! I always wanted them, but doubted my shrimp keeping abilities and got my feet wet with the pumpkin neos.

Lo and behold, his CRS are born and raised with Cherries, and our water conditions are similar!

 

They are settling in like they've always been here:

 

Howdy, Cousins!

 

 

 

 

 

Young CRS with Pumpkin Neo shrimpette:

 

 

I love the swirly motion in this shot:

 

 

CRS juvie:

 

 

AWESOME Birthday gift

I hope more photos follow, and will keep y'all updated.

There are 5, I don't know who is male or female, and there are more coming in the future, if these do well.

 

-Stef*

[Darkcobra]

Also, adding the Purigen to discourage new nitrate creation, in combination with regular water changes and plants to remove existing nitrate, has successfully reduced nitrates from at least 60ppm to a little over 20ppm.  In just over a week.  I'm impressed!  I've had a bottle of Purigen sitting around forever, but other than tossing some in a tank once to assist with clearing cloudiness, I've never really experimented with it.  Current TDS is 301, I'll start testing/logging that and nitrate levels weekly to see how they progress over time, so I can get some idea about how long the Purigen lasts.  Will also be interesting to see if it has any effect on the little bit of algae, though that's not something we're really concerned about; anything but BGA is welcome in reasonable quantities.

 

I guess I'll break down and get a new GH test as well.  My remin recipe may need to be altered (again, LOL) to keep it in a compromise range for both neocaridina and caridina.  Found some conflicting info about the latter.  Some say water should be alkaline, otherwise the shells get eroded and lose their shine.  But others say this reduces freshly hatched CRS survival rate to near zero.  Hmm.  Last time I checked pH was 6.1, I think I'll bring it up slowly to 6.5-6.8 in the coming weeks.

 

EDIT:  Oh, I forgot.  These CRS were represented as SS grade.  Looks about right to my completely untrained eye.  If anyone considers them a different grade I'd be curious to hear, though we'd still be very happy with them.

[Soothing Shrimp]

They look great together! 

 

Here's some quick crs grading guides:

 

[Merth]

Chris feel free to shout at me anytime you want to test your gh/kh and i'll bring my trst kit to work for you to borrow

[Merth]

Oh and I can share some salty shrimp gh+ as well if you want to experiment with it

[Darkcobra]

[soothing Shrimp]:  LOL, I didn't realize there were that many variations!  Does a shrimp's color pattern remain relatively unchanged throughout its life, or change as it grows?

 

[Merth]:  Thanks for the offer!  I already got a GH test on order by the time I saw it, bundled in with a shipment of Flourite.  As for the Salty Shrimp GH+, now that has me thinking.  We're not to the point yet where a side-by-side test of DIY remin vs. SS GH+ is feasible.  But I might be able to get a sample professionally analyzed for elemental content.  I'm pretty sure this would include calcium, magnesium, potassium, sodium, and carbonate.  Not sure if sulfur, chlorine, and iodine are possible.  And exact chemical composition would remain unknown, for example calcium is detectable, but whether it's in the form of a sulfate/citrate/gluconate and in what proportions would not.  Although I might be able to at least detect presence of citrate/gluconate by taste.

 

The question is whether at least a few people would find this sufficiently useful, to be encouraged to try DIY remin as a result.  Getting this done will require asking a favor or two, and though no one is counting, I try not to do it too often.

[Soothing Shrimp]

If it saves money, you bet I'd be interested.

 

And the pattern stays thesame throughout life.

[Water7]

That's exciting that you got some Crystal Reds! I hope they do very well for you. The moss in the "swirly motion" picture is really beautiful and healthy looking too. What kind is it? It looks like you have bolbitis fern too? I am wondering, do you use any fertilizers for your plants in this tank?