Plant Die-off

oh no, Jesnon Hope you find your shrimpy ok

oh no, Jesnon Hope you find your shrimpy ok

Unfortunately it's not looking too good. I did a water change earlier and moved all the decor around and I still can only spot 3 shrimps, half the number I started with 

I think one of the indicators of a happy shrimp is that they do not hide all the time (some hiding is perfectly normal) but swim around freely when they feel like it – with all fish around. Happy shrimps just go about their business completely ignoring the fish or even (like mine often do) treating the fish in the same way as plants or decor – just “something on their way” (mine regularly land on the fish using them as a sort of “landing point” or an object convenient to be on at the moment for whatever reason – mainly getting closer to food).

Hi Jesnon, Hmm, maybe Endlers are not so angelic, indeed. Since I kept Guppies as I child, I sort of went “done this before” when I returned to fish keeping later on, so I never had Guppies or related Endlers... I don’t know but they may be prone to hunting down shrimps' babies as well (they are quick so they have a good chance). So, maybe some fluffy real or artificial plant will help... Another thought – when you go to get some more shrimps, it is good to try to get them from some local aquarium enthusiast selling them rather than a shop – they will be born in a water similar to yours and not shipped from far away (as many LFS’s ones are). Aquarist classified, Ebay – have a look if there is anything available.

Natalia your description of shrimp using fish as landing spots - ha! This is where I'm a little confused as my shrimp do honestly seem very happy. The reason I can easily spot when one has gone missing is because they don't often hide and if I sit long enough in front of the tank I can usually find them all - they seem to really like hanging out together most of the time, and will swim around quite happily and never seem to really take any notice of the fish. They seem really attached to two of my artificial plants as they're always resting on the leaves, and especially love to hide inbetween some of the leaves.

One odd thing I've noticed with my shrimp who's developed the saddle is that she keeps swimming eratically upside down!? She seems happy otherwise, but every now and then she dashes about upside down throughout the tank, especially around my algae magnet. Not really sure if this is normal shrimp behaviour or not! Perhaps since she's got eggs she's searching for a male shrimp.

When you say fluffy plants - what kind of fluffy plant do you think I could grow OK in my low light setup? I do have quite a few plants in there now, I've got the two large artificial plants that my shrimp love, one moss ball, a big java fern I've put on one of my rocks, the 'pronged' java fern (I can't remember what it's official name is!) which is on both of my bog wood (though I might give one of the bits up as a bad job on one of them as it just will not stay put!) and then another plant near the front of my tank that I've completely forgotten the name of. No fluffy plants though as you say! My tank is looking a little full these days, but if I won't kill off the plant too easily and it might help my shrimpies then I'm happy to make some changes (I think since you're so good at aquascaping and with plants Natalia you would probably look at my poor tank and cry, it's not very well set up these days!)

I've never thought to buy locally to be honest. I know one of my LFS tends to buy off of local breeders rather than ship in, and I always assumed because the MA is just down the road our water would be very similar but as you say they probably aren't bred here. I'll have to investigate whether I can get some RCS locally. The idea of postal orders when it comes to fish and shrimp still confuses me though!

The small clump of Salvinia that survived is still alive. During the night I leave the feeding flaps open slightly; but during the day, with the temperatures at the moment, I have them fully open. Hopefully no fish will decide to jump out.......

I definitely have four cherry shrimps, 2 adults and 2 juveniles, as I have seen all four at once. There may be others as well. You can only be certain of the number visible at any one time. Since they are out and about, these four must be reasonable happy with their tank mates.
I do have plastic plants similar to the one in the link. I've found newly hatched pygmy cories under one spherical plant (think moss ball shape but plastic) so if the cories can survive in/under those plants, they should be OK for newly hatched cherries as well?

Great news Sue on the plant front, sorry to hear about the shrimp though. And good news you got a refund on the Beta G.

Sorry I thought I had already replied to this but obviously got distracted! I think I've seen a similar plastic plant to that in my local Pets at Home so may have to get myself one of those for when my shrimpies potentially have babies. Unfortunately right now I'm down to 3 from the original 6 I started with - the large bright red shrimp, another deep red and the pale girl with the saddle. Since I'm now moving house I won't be buying any more shrimp until after the move when the tank is settle again as keen as I am to get more shrimp! It just seems like the most sensible thing to do for now.

Do you have any recommendations for the best way to move my shrimpies for the 2 - 3 hours of driving and setting up the tank again? Just the idea of it is stressing me out!

I hadn't even thought about them having something to stand on! Will definitely bag them with one of my plants.

Ooh that's not a bad idea Sue - will see what happens once I move!

It all depends on
1) will the female live long enough for the eggs to hatch. I'm keeping my fingers crossed as the shrimp have all died trying to moult and she shouldn't moult till the eggs have hatched
2) if the eggs do hatch, how many babies will there be and how many will die immediately


He doesn't object too much to temporary additional tanks, quarantining for example. So if I do end up with any baby shrimp I'll set up the QT till they are big enough to go in with endlers and pygmy cories. If any survive long enough. Because I've no idea how long she's been carrying eggs (it takes the light shining through her abdomen in a certain direction to see them) I've no idea how long it'll be before the eggs hatch. I have read 30 days in total, and it's been a week and a bit since I saw the eggs. I'm fully expecting all the babies to die from what's been killing the adults so I didn't want to set up the QT till I knew I had live babies.

A week later -

One of the juvenile shrimps died during the week, and I found the adult female dead this morning, leaving one juvenile. The adult female corpse did not have any eggs under the abdomen, but I couldn't see any sign of life except for the juvenile shrimp. So I decided to move that one back to the 50 litre and close down the QT.

But being the 'better safe than sorry' type, first I removed all the decor bit by bit, shaking each bit thoroughly in the tank before putting it in the bucket, then I moved the last shrimp - and noticed tiny things moving on the tank bottom. Using airline tubing, I hoovered the muck of the bottom of the tank and realised that besides baby cherry shrimp, I also had baby pygmy cories 
I checked the bucket that had the decor in and the bucket I siphoned the water into by decanting it a bit at a time into a small plastic tub, and used a pipette that you get with medication with the thin end trimmed off to catch more babies of both species. Took ages, but it was worth it. I now have about 5 baby cories and around a dozen baby shrimp.

The pygmy cories like the spherical plastic plants for laying eggs in, there must have been eggs on the one I moved to the QT last week. I've put that plant back in the 50 litre tank, and put the other one into the QT. You never know!


Now to go and look up how long it takes for pygmy cory eggs to hatch.........



Edit - 3 to 5 days. So if I swap plants every 5 days, there is a chance of there being some eggs on them.

That's what I'm wondering. Only Natalia will know for sure.



I've just had another shrimp death - when I came to feed the fish tonight, I found the female amano in my 125 litre dead. In this case, I wonder if it was her age. I don't know the life expectancy of amano shrimps, but I bought five on 18 Feb 2009 from Maidenhead Aquatics in York (yes I do keep records  ). One died shortly after purchase, one female died last year and the other female died today, leaving 2 males. I presume they are in the tank somewhere; I hardly ever see them, and I haven't found any bodies.


Edit - forgot to mention that I finally had the chance to measure the female amano. She was 2 inches/5cm from nose to tail not counting her antennae.
And I've just seen a male in the tank!

I've just googled it; most sources say amano shrimps (Caridina multidentata) have a life expectancy in captivity of 2 to 3 years, though one website does say up to 4 years. It looks like it was just old age then.