Crs And Edmonton Tap Water?

[AJanzen]

Hey everyone, been wanting to add some CRS to my cherry shrimp tank for a while now. The shrimp tank is an established, planted 10G and the RCS are thriving in it. My levels in the tank have all tested well, my only concern being with the hardness. I usually just use treated tap water for all my water change outs so naturally using edmonton city water my levels are pretty high in all my tanks. Alot of what I've read up on about the CRS is they can be quite finicky and prefer a softer water (4-6gH). Just wondering if anyone else out there has had much experience with them and whether or not the hardness is something to actually be concerned about with them.

[ckmullin]

heard of a few and also myself who did keep crs for some length of time. if you want the crs to thrive and not just survive, do what they say to recreate those conditions exactly! if your going to keep crs, I'd suggest an ro unit.

[Vallisneria]

I believe there are a few people keeping them in Edmonton water but I haven't had any luck. I've killed hundreds of $ worth trying to over the years So now I just stick to the neocaridina sp. Your best chance would be to find some that have been acclimated to edmonton water for a while.

[jumpsmasher]

One of the most important thing I learned during my time with them is that unless you are prepared to invest in a R/O unit (and essentially create the "ideal" water from scratch), the key is to maintain stable water parameters. CRS are very susceptible to any changes unless it is done very slowly, they will get stressed and slowly die off. Both the japanese and germans have been very successful breeders when it comes to bee shrimps and they both a very hard tap water. Of course, the japanese have relied on the use of "active" soil to buffer their water (more on this later) but the germans in particular have been content with their tap water and adapted their shrimps quite well.

The main issue with using tap water is the stability - tap water can changes over time and if you don't monitor it carefully when you change your water it might stress out your shrimps. The water coming in should be as close as possible as the water in the tank (PH, GH, KH, temp, TDS, etc;). Needless to say things like ammonia, nitrites and nitrates should be zero. Invest in a test kit for all of the above if you don't already have one. If you can maintain stable parameters over time than there is no reason not to give it a shot.

With my first CRS tank, I used city tap water but what I did was filter it using my brita water filter and let it sit overnight to get it to room temperature. It was only small 5gal nano tank and I probably lost aobut 1/2 of them slowly over time but one of the surviving female got berried about 3 months after I got her and from that I got 25-30 baby shrimps who survived to adulthood. Of course all of the original adults in that tank eventually died (still got some of the first batch of babies) but it was start for me and a learned quite a bit from that experience. From there I moved on to bigger tanks, fancier shrimps and started using active shrimp soil like Fluval Shrimp stratum, R/O water, shrimp minerals etc;.

In your case, if you decide to try some CRS, I recommend starting out with a few low grade CRS if you can find them locally. When you first get them use a drip acclimatization over several hours (like 4-8 hours!) to acclimatize them to your tank water.

Do the same when you doing water changes - drip the new water back into the tank using airline tubing and a control valve (1-2 drops per sec). Again use "aged" tap water so let it sit overnight or longer. Some people have also report issues using with Seachem Prime as a dechlorinator so you might want to avoid that particular product.

Also be aware that some stones / rocks / gravel and even filter bio media tend to buffer the ph of the tank so if your tank water is consistently more alkaline than the tap water he might be one of the causes.

Another alternative to CRS are tiger shrimps. One of my next project would be a tiger shrimp tank using regular gravel and harder water. The tank they are currently in now is due for a changeover as the Fluval Shrimp Statum that is in there now has lost it buffering ability due to age. That plus the seiryu stones I have in there has slowly buffered the ph in that tank to 7.5. but they seems to be alright, I am now on to my 3rd generation of OEBT's (only about 3 weeks old shrimplets).

I still have issues with temperature as i live in a condo and it is like an oven in the summer but learned to be content with keeping things at room temperature to avoid wild temperature swings from setting my heaters too low (to the "ideal" temperature).

Hope this helps and good luck!

[ckmullin]

one quick tip...if you go on vacation, make sure your 'tank keeper' understand exactly what must be done. If not well...

[Sprucegruve]

one quick tip...if you go on vacation, make sure your 'tank keeper' understand exactly what must be done. If not well...

this advise is some of the most important you will get,either be happy with no one touching your tanks the entire time your not in town.

or spend the time and teach one of your friends how to do it ''just how you like it''

i get so worried about it i usually write down everything they need to do aswell.....in a step by step guide.......even though its always the same person doing my work

[AJanzen]

Quick question, with the drip method do you siphon it like an old school gravel filter and then control the drip or is their an easier way? Sorry, just never tried the drip method before. Makes sense though.

[ckmullin]

cannot comment on the drip method as never used but curious what do you want to drip with the crs water?

[Sprucegruve]

Quick question, with the drip method do you siphon it like an old school gravel filter and then control the drip or is their an easier way? Sorry, just never tried the drip method before. Makes sense though.

cannot comment on the drip method as never used but curious what do you want to drip with the crs water?

this is easy,grab some extra airline/airtube/airpump hose......whatever you want to call it.

then drip acclimate

tie it in a loose knot....start a syphon from the tank with this airline.

then let it slowly drip into the shrimp bag,after hours remove some water from the bag,then continue driping untill the bag fills again.

Edited May 9, 2012 by Sprucegruve

[ckmullin]

I thought he was talking about drip dosing not drip acclimate. i guess my bad

[jumpsmasher]

Quick question, with the drip method do you siphon it like an old school gravel filter and then control the drip or is their an easier way? Sorry, just never tried the drip method before. Makes sense though.

cannot comment on the drip method as never used but curious what do you want to drip with the crs water?

this is easy,grab some extra airline/airtube/airpump hose......whatever you want to call it.

then drip acclimate

tie it in a loose knot....start a syphon from the tank with this airline.

then let it slowly drip into the shrimp bag,after hours remove some water from the bag,then continue driping untill the bag fills again.

yup just as Sprucegruve mention, use a regular airline tubing - i prefer using a control valve to control the flow but either way works.

For new shrimps, depending on how the shrimps are bagged you can just use the bag they come in (regular fish bag) or cut the bag and empty the content into container (best for breather bags). If you are going to leave it unattended it is best to put it into a pail or bucket in case it overflows. If they don't come with some moss inside the bag, grab some from your tank and put it inside the container / bag so that they have something to latch onto.

If you planning to use 100% tap water, it helps to keep a reservoir of aged water in case the parameters of the tap water temporarily spikes.

If you are topping up the tank due to evaporation, only use R/O water - if you use regular tap water to top up, the concentration will keep building up over time.

If for some reason you want to adjust the parameters of the tank water, do it slowly in small incremental steps over days or weeks.