Shrimp Disease And Treatments

[Charis]

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?

[jumpsmasher]

1) Could you help me define normal vs. abnormal behaviour for shrimp?

I would say "normal" behavior would vary from species to species but shrimps don't stay motionless out in the open for too long; a healthy shrimp would always be piacking away at the biofilm on the glass, substrate and other objects in the tank. If they need to rest (i.e. just after a molt) they tend to do so away from view like under a driftwood or the underside of a leaf or on the sponge filter. If they are just out in the open and not doing much, it is probably a good sign. Of course i had shrimps just dropped dead on me too.. one second they looked normal and next thing you know they just flop over.

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?

Certainty it is not a bad idea to do so if you have the tank space. Shrimps are prone to bacteria infection (see below) when they are stressed so that could spread to other shrimps and wipe out an entire population if left untreated.

3) What are the most common shrimp diseases that I should be watching for and what are the known treatments for these?

The only real disease have encountered so far are bacteria infections. It is more common in Tiger shrimps but i have seen it in neo's and my CRS / CBS as well. It occurs when the shrimps get stressed such rapid changes in their environments, temperature, warm temperatures, poor water quality etc;

symptoms include missing limbs / antennas and cloudy body.

http://www.shrimpnow.com/content.php/277-shrimp-bacterial-infection-paraguard

Think of it as a cross between Ich (similar causes) and fin/tail rot (similar effects on the antennas / limbs)

The first thing you want to do is to remedy the situation that cause them to get stressed in the first place like the temperature or poor water quality.

You than want to treat the tank with with either Paraguard + large water changes as stated in the link above or with Hydrogen Peroxide (my preferred method). I dose my 6% hydrogen Peroxide (same mixture i use for my oxydators) at 1ml / gallon daily for two weeks. It also a good idea supplement the treatments with beta-glucan (GlasGarten beta-glucan, Mosure Tonic Pro, Borneowild Shield) and Indian Almond leaves. The bad news is neither method is really at effectively at treating the infection. Unfortunately, once the individual show common symptoms the chances of them recovering is very slim. The good news is disease spread fairly slowly so you can keep it in check and eventually stop the spread of it by removing any dead specimens from the tank as soon as possible and / or any infected individuals in conjunction with the above treatments.

There is also something called Black Spot Disease. I don't have any experience with this one but there is some info here:

http://www.aquaticquotient.com/forum/showthread.php/70785-Black-Spot-Disease-and-other-diseases

There is also parasites and worms can are common in shrimps tanks

Planaria / Hydra you probably know about. Usually they don't attack adults are known to attack babies and weaken shrimps. There are several commercial treatments that work quite well (but will also kill snails)

There is also a parasite that latches on the the head of shrimps called Scutariella japonica - they look like little white worms

http://scapeclub.org/forum/showthread.php?23916-Parasitic-worms-leeches-Scutariella

http://www.shrimptank.ca/2014/03/white-worms-neocaridina-shrimp-head

You will sometimes find worms on the body as well - not sure if they are Scutariella japonica as well but treatment for both are the same; just a brief salt bath.

Molting issues can be common as well, sometimes this is caused by having less than ideal water conditions; water too hard or lacking minerals.The shrimp will look like it got struck while molting and die before it can finish molting. But generally if it is a one-off I usually just write it off as a bad molt which happens from time to time - I usually don't get too concern unless it happening to a bunch of them around the same time.

[Charis]

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.

[jumpsmasher]

Most invertebrates like shrimp are quite sensitive to standard medication so I generally avoid them. If you do use them it would be best to start at 1/2 the standard dosage.

The parasite look nasty because of the magnification but in person they look like little white spikes and for the most part are fairly harmless and easy enuf to get rid of with a salt dip. To be honest I don't really measure how much salt I use. Usually I out in a teaspoon into one of my small external breeder box and dip the shrimp for a second or two; the worms detaches very quickly so you don't need to keep then in there long. Than again I only did this with my neo's; have yet to see a tiger or CRS/CBS shrimp infected with these worms.