Charis

I haven't tried it, but from I've read the parameter overlap of the two types is narrow. So, keeping them both happy enough to breed would take a lot of tweeking. It's easiest and more successful to keep them separate.

Nice. I guess the AQ salt doesn't have any negative impact on the crayfish? How long are your baths and at what concentration is the salt?

Can you tell me more about that parasite? I tried Googling it and I didn't get any hits. I'd love to learn more.

Interesting about the Prime! I didn't know that! I've always thought it was a dream product! Ha! I guess it's not a dream product for all species. I'm going to run out and get a nitrate test kit tomorrow. It was on my to-do list, but obviously I need it asap. In the mean time, I'm doing a 25% water change adding in the new water via drip over a long period of time. Hopefully it helps. I did not know that I should be using pure RO! I thought that I was supposed to be making the water that I'm adding the same as what is already in the tank in terms of parameters. I guess this is not correct? How often do you do actual water changes?

I purchased from Aquabid, Soshrimp, who I understand also imports and resells. I'll send him an email and see if he has any advise. His parameters are ph7.0-7.5 gh8-10 tds250-300 temp72-75 I'm topping off with the RO/Tap mix. It's weird that they handled the transition into the water fine and would just start dieing about three weeks later. Is that sometimes what happens? Unfortunately, I now have a dead one in my Blue Dream tap with a few others looking lethargic. Can you think of an illness that may cause this? Do you think it is my water parameters? I have heard of many people keeping neos in pure tap waters, so I had thought that RO/tap would be a step up. I don't currently have the ability to remineralize pure RO to the perfect spot for Neos. I only bought Salty Shrimp for CRS.

I have started having an increased number of shrimp deaths in my Orange Rili tank. These shrimp were purchased and imported at the start of December. The first death was the day before Christmas. It's possible two more died and were eaten while I was away of the holidays and since being back there was one death yesterday and another that is 95% dead right now. There are no noticeable physically changes in the shrimp's appearance. They are still perfectly colored and no missing parts! They seem to get more lethargic, sitting in the open and then more clumsy, almost like they are dragging their front legs a bit. Slowly they die and end up on their backs and sides. It really worries me because 5 have died and one of the large females is now starting to look slow and clumsy. Ugh. Two batches of shrimplets hatched over the holiday and there are a ton of them in the tank. As far as I can tell, I don't see any dead shrimplets on the floor. I would have thought they would be the most susceptible to anything. I'm feeding NLS Grow. I have tried spinach leaves, algae tabs and a veggie food, but the shrimp only seem to actually want to eat the Grow. There isn't any copper in the ingredients, but maybe there is something else bad I should be looking for? Water parameters are fine, I think. Ammonia 0, Nitrite 0, TDS 222, pH 7.9, KH 7, GH 9. I'm using a RO, tap water mix and the tap water is treated with Prime. My only unknown is Nitrate.... so that could be off. Temp is 74-75F. It's a planted tank with quite a few plants and lots of java moss. It's filtered by a sponge filter and I have been adding what has evaporated each week via drip method. Any ideas what in the world is going on?! I'm very tempted to do a huge water change to get whatever it is out of the tank! But, I know shrimp don't really like water changes! Should I pull the shrimp and put them in a different tank?! Would that be helpful? It would be possible with the adult, but the shrimplets would have to be left. Thus far my tanks of Blue Dreams and the few CRS that the seller included don't seem impacted. I feel like I may be seeing a behaviour change in the Blue Dreams, but I'm likely just panicking. I really want to figure out how to fix this before I lose the Rilis or accidentally spread it.

Actually, the feeding situation is an interesting thing. The copepod situation initially exploded before I even started to cycle the tank. It was planted.... Healthy plants and nothing decaying. No fish, so nothing to feed. The polulation exploded. So, their numbers weren't growing based on anything that I can understand them feeding on. Even now, I feed the shrimp every 2-3 days, and remove anything they haven't eaten after 2-3 hours via an airline siphoning tubing. So, if they could be starved out, I think I'd be set!

Thanks, all, for your responses! Unfortunately, these copepods are really unsightly! It's like taking an empty, wet tank and pouring salt down the sides, giving it a little brush and seeing what sticks. The walls of the tank are covered in white grains. It wouldn't be so bad if they tank wasn't built into the wall of the hall so it could be viewed really easily. It needs to be a decent looking tank! I don't mind seeing the adult copepods zip around... but the shear numbers are crazy. Interestingly enough, I have yet to find a "medicated" solution online. When I've done my searches most people suggest the addition of fish (which isn't preferable with my shrimp) and just enjoying them and seeing them as part of a healthy eco system. It makes me giggle a bit to think of them as the sign of a healthy eco system because so far I am of the impression that they could survive a nuclear blast! He he he! I've never heard of spixi snails. Are they basically assassin snails? It's an idea. I've heard of assassin snails eating shrimplets... but if that's not the case, it would be a really easy solution. Of interest, I've read that copepods can carry nematode larva? I don't know if this is true or not. I dealt with a nematode infestation in one of my tanks about a year ago and it was a huge pain... trying to get levamisole from the states, dosing it three times, weeks apart... huge water changes. I don't want to risk anything like that again if these little guys can spread something to my fish in the case of cross contamination of tanks (which I try very hard to avoid). Drying out the tank and tossing the plants might be what has to happen if nothing can be added to the water to get rid of them. If that's the case, I'll guess I'll just wait a bit and see how things progress with both the copepod and shrimp population. It's bit too close to Christmas to be breaking down a tank and setting up something new. Thank you all for your input and more ideas are very welcome!

Thank you so much for your response. I do have tetras in a seperate tank so adding them would be very easy and I'm sure that they would make a significant dent in the copepod population. However, if they willing to eat something as tiny as a copepod, I've read they will also eat the shrimplets and the goal of the tank is to have a thriving and increasing shrimp population. I could remove the shrimp and let the tetras go to town, but since these little nasties survived either boiling, alcohol or bleaching and came back with a bang, I don't know if the tetras would be able to completely eradicate them. I think the population would just increase again once the tetras were removed and the shrimp replaced. Too be honest, I'm hoping to find some sort of medicated solution. If there is some natural product that will do it, all the better, but I'm wanting to find something that will be effective against them without harming the shrimp, or if necessary, I'll remove the shrimp and treat the tank. I just have no idea what to use.

I purchased some new aquatic plants a couple of months ago from an online seller and apparently they came with an abundance of copepods. I ended up breaking down the tank, sterilizing it with alcohol, bleaching the driftwood and plants and boiling the substrate. I set everything up again, let it run for a while, added a cycled sponge filter and it became home to my new neos. Now, I'm seeing that there are copepod babies or eggs, or whatever they are all over the glass again. How in the world do I get rid of these things? Are they harmful to shrimp? Even if they are not, I'd like to figure out how to kill them because they seem to increase explosively and are quite an eye sore. Any ideas would be very appreciated!

Great! Thanks so much! I'm excited for this little adventure to begin!

I have the api nexx filter as well. I had read about leaking problems from the amazon reviews but I had a problem free first 6 months or so with it. Once or twice I noticed it leaking after I cleaned it and realized that I hadn't twisted the top on properly. Something about not getting the top sealed quite right seemed to change the pressure and allow it to leak a bit for the top, but more significantly from the base. Once the top was opened up again and resealed more carefully if worked great. I had a far more significant leak days after a water change, several months ago. I thought I had resealed it correctly, and didn't notice it leaking. Several days later we realized that the hardwood floor around the tank was saturated, the dry wall was wet and we had water running into the basement. This had been slowly happening for days and never noticed it! Terrible. Anyways, based on my experience, these guys have to be very carefully resealed and be under diligent observation post-water change to make sure they are not leaking. It's a shame when they are such nice, quiet filters. Long story short, I found the key to be properly resealing the top, making sure the bottom is seated correctly and watching them like a hawk after you'd done any maintenance. You may want to read some of the more negative amazon reviews just to hear how other people have solved their problems with the filter.... some of them had some good suggestions.

Thanks fat puffer! How long did you found they took from hatching to a re-homeable size? With lots of hides, what percentage of the babies survived? Any particular food that you found worked well? Did you start feeding as soon as they were hatched and moving?

My Australian Blue "Lobster" has been berried for almost two weeks now and has been hiding out in her Cichlid cave. She's in a shared, but divided, 20 Gallon with the male she bred to. My intention is to fill my 75Gallon half full and place her in there shortly so that once the eggs hatch, the baby crayfish will have lots of room to get away from her and each other. Once I see the free moving baby crays, I'll move her back to the 20G. Do you think a change of tank/water will give her any trouble carrying the eggs to term if she is slowly acclimatized? Would it be better to remove the male from her tank, and once the babies are born try to catch them all and move them to the 75?! Sounds like a lot more work! I've cut up lots of small PVC pipes for hides.... Does anyone have any experience with crayfish babies and care to give me some general tips? These will be my first baby crays....

Thank you so much for this wealth of information, Jumpsmasher! I appreciate the links... they were interesting reads. Ugh, those parasites look terrible. Pretty nasty. It was interesting that antibiotics were not mentioned as treatment for the bacterial issues. These are often overused in fish keeping and for inappropriate applications, but are they completely avoided with shrimp? I'm just curious about that... I also thought the mention of salt dips as treatment was interesting. Do you have any idea of the tsp/tbsp/gallon shrimp can tolerate as a dip? I actually shocked they can handle a dip at all, since they don't even like fast water changes! Well, I learned a lot! Thank you so much! I'll have my eagle eye on these little guys.

I actually have a marina external breeding box that I've never tried out. I'm a little afraid to get it wrong... but it can't be that tough! I'll give it a try! It will probably be more room and water circulation for these guys. Thanks for the idea. I forgot that I even have it!

I'm completely new to keeping shrimp and I'm hoping to gather a little more info that would help me with their care. Unlike fish, I don't know what behaviour or problems to be watching for with these little guys and I want to know what I should be watching for so I can catch things before they really begin. 1) Could you help me define normal vs. abnormal behaviour for shrimp? 2) Do you typically to a 2-3 week quarantine for new shrimp before adding them to an existing shrimp tank, as you would do for fish? 3) What are the most common shrimp diseases that I should be watching for and what are the known treatments for these?

I don't think there are any sort of valves that automatically close on my unit… but I bought a very cheap one! And, it's not permanently hooked up to anything. I'll bet there are all kinds of fancy inclusions with the more expensive units! Sorry, Iceturf, I can't help you…. I'm just here asking questions. I do know that I'm remineralizing mine outside of my unit. I bet these other guys have tons of great thoughts for you. My shrimp arrived from the states today. Not a single DOA! I am so impressed! I did a very slow drip acclimatization and they seem quite happy, ripping around the aquarium. Unfortunately, one of the tanks that I was going to use had some ammonia this morning. Maybe my cycled sponge filter wasn't quite cycled after all. I ended up putting 10 of the Blue Dreams in a breeder box in the Orange Rili tank. Do you think this set up will be ok for a bit? Or do shrimp go crazy with a small amount of space? Let me know your thoughts.

Well, they sound inexpensive, so it doesn't seem like a big deal to just cap off all three.

I'll do that! Pretty minimal investment compared to the membrane… finding time to go to the hardware store is another issue! It will happen, though!

Ah yes, the cost! Very true when you point out it really is the cost of only a few shrimp…. and if it prevents them from dieing AND simplifies everything, why am I resisting! Excellent points made and I think I'll get some amazonia. In regards to the fittings, there is an intake and two outputs on my RO unit. Do you need a valve for all three of these? Or just the intake? Thank you everyone, I really appreciate the information.

Ah yes! Look at those little guys! Thanks for the link… it's good to have a visual.

Thanks for the advice! Is John Guest the name brand? Or the type of valve? I'll have to think more about the substrate. If the RO and remineralization has put given the correct parameters, are the buffering substrates necessary to keep the numbers down? If you don't have these does the pH and TDS go back up?

Thank you! The valves in the lines are a great idea! I guess you can just find something like that at Home Depot? I'm starting to feel like I live in the their tubing section.... I'm trying to get setup for both neos and caridinas. On that note, do you find it necessary to alter our tap water with RO for the neos? I'm aware that their preference is a pH that's a bit lower than ours, but will they actually do fine and reproduce without altering the water parameters? Clearly the caridinas need the RO water. If I was to get some sort of a buffering substrate that will keep the pH lower, is there anything cheaper than the amazonia?

Ok, false alarm. My TDS is already down to 8 and the pH is now 6.4, so I can't complain about that. It must just be the "breaking in" of the filter that was giving me higher readings. But, I'd still love others input on their systems and expectations. Also, when they say the membrane must stay wet, how do I do that? I only plan on using this a couple times a week. Does it dry out in-between? Thanks!