feeding RCS

pleco_breeder · Post by **pleco_breeder** » Mon Jul 23, 2007 8:56 am

Hello all,

Some of you already know that I've had problems with getting my female RCS to develop saddles. I had a single spawn that resulted in 4 new shrimp several weeks back, but no spawns since. I decided to try an experiment earlier this week to see if I just wasn't feeding them correctly as I stopped placing copepods, daphnia, etc... in the tank when I noticed that this was increasing the nitrates in the shrimp tank too quickly.

I don't keep leaf litter in the tank because it's just too difficult to find oak leaves in the middle of the Sonoran Desert, and the citrus trees I can collect from tend to drop pH very fast. As a result, I surmised that the shrimp were probably being deprived of the live micro foods needed in their diet for proper growth and reproduction.

To make a long story short, I started feeding the tank from my various nematode cultures - microworms, walter worms, and bananna worms - 5 days ago. I am only feeding every second day with these, and continuing my regular small daily feeding of fish pellets. The results have been almost instant.

The mother of the first spawn was saddled only 1 day after the first feeding, and a second female - which I didn't even realize was a female - has started developing a saddle this morning.

These are not the best colored RCS I've seen, and barely have any color other than the stripe along the back, so I'm obviously hopeful that the new addition to their diet will also help this after a couple of molts. However, I'm not going to hold my breath on that one.

This post is basically just to have the info available for other hobbyists, but I would be interested in any experiences other members have had from using live foods in shrimp only tanks.

Larry Vires

badflash · Post by **badflash** » Mon Jul 23, 2007 9:42 am

Get something like a plant based food like spirulina flake. They may be getting too much animal protein (just a guess). Lots of meat also increase nitrates and phosphates. I learned the hard way that phosphates over about 5 ppm shuts down the shrimp reproductive system.

pleco_breeder · Post by **pleco_breeder** » Mon Jul 23, 2007 11:01 am

Nitrate and phosphate are both so low that hobbyist kits hardly show a change. I had tried the spirulina foods early on in this experiment, and have regularly switched the type of foods being fed on a weekly rotation. Although there is java moss in the tank to provide a bit of vertical surface area, as well as a sponge filter, that should provide area for micro-organisms, there are no visible signs of any type of of bio-film. I started this experiment for that exact reason. Even algae that I try to culture on rocks in outside tubs as a supplement are picked clean within hours. Anything that the shrimp don't eat within just a few minutes, live or flake, is snail food as fast as they can get there.

The snails are a kind of "catch 22". The shrimp didn't spawn before they were placed into the tank because even small feedings were effecting water quality. Likewise, spawning stopped once they were established because the bio-film and algae are eaten as fast as it can develop.

It is possible that this is just a fluke that the shrimp are positively responding to the nematode feedings, but I don't see any negatives yet. Tomorrow is my scheduled water change day, and water quality is still pristine. One bonus to the nematodes that I didn't mention before is that they live for quite some time, more than 24 hours, in water if I do happen to overfeed and the snails don't seem to bother with eating them because of their mobility. I've been careful about the quantity fed, and still don't feed as much to the tank as I would normally give a small pair of apistos.

The post was simply put up as reference for others having similar issues. Despite the quality of flake/pellet foods, everything from generic to NLS and Vibra Gro, my tank has refused to as much as develop a saddle when some form of life food was not being introduced. The planktonic foods were causing obvious problems and I presume this was caused by their ability to evade the shrimp. The nematodes can move away, but not as quickly and are an easy supplement that appears to solve the problem. Further refinement of the feeding schedule may be necessary if water quality problems do eventually arise, but given the mainentance schedule I don't see this becoming an issue.

Larry Vires

badflash · Post by **badflash** » Mon Jul 23, 2007 12:51 pm

How much light is the tank getting?
I'm wondering if there are trace minerals or something affecting them. It is really odd what is happening.

I have great success with kenn's veggie flakes- I powder them and use very sparingly. I also use just plain oak leaves and let them rot.

pleco_breeder · Post by **pleco_breeder** » Mon Jul 23, 2007 9:12 pm

The tank gets only slightly less light than my plant tanks. Both get direct sunlight via a large window in the fish room, but the shrimp tank is slightly further away from the window.

As mentioned above, oak leaves are not readily available. I know where I can get them, but it would involve an hour and a half drive and couple hour hike up a very steep slope. They just don't survive here. The environment in Arizona desert valleys just isn't hospitable to most plants. The few native species of trees generally have chemical protection in the form of allergens and various oils that I wouldn't feel comfortable attempting those in livestock tanks. I did try orange and lemon leaves, a lot of citrus trees around, but the this dropped the pH rather quickly.

I've also given thought to the question of trace minerals, but wouldn't feel comfortable about adding anything to the water unless I stripped it to nothing first. I've lived all over the country, and this is the hardest water I've found anywhere. All this was discussed in my original post, but as a refresher, conductivity here currently runs 3,000 ms plus. I actually get calcium deposits under the water line in some tank if I don't keep up with maintenance.

The idea behind the use of nematodes is to supplement enough that the lack of micro organisms and detritus from the leaves enough that the shrimp will still reproduce. So far, it appears to be going in the right direction. However, there is a difference between having saddles and being berried. I won't know that it has worked till I see another successful hatch.

Larry Vires

badflash · Post by **badflash** » Tue Jul 24, 2007 4:49 am

If you have an R/O unit, why don't you try a test tank with re-constituted water? I know that a lot of the water table out there was disturbed with mining of various metals like copper and silver. Who knows what is in that water?

pleco_breeder · Post by **pleco_breeder** » Tue Jul 24, 2007 7:56 am

I fully intend to begin using RO for everything in the room, but I'm still in the process of setting up tanks. The final placement of the RO unit, in order to make use of the most space, would be in the way of bringing new racks in. Sadly, I have to wait till the rest of the tanks are placed before I can set it up. Not being able to set up the RO unit yet is actually very annoying. I have several species of rare/uncommon pleco breeders that will not spawn without it so most of the tanks I have running are just in limbo till the room is complete.

This does bring me to another question though. I've been working on a central system for shrimp since the first RCS spawn. I want to be able to keep some of the more uncommon varieties in the rack: CRS, tiger, green, etc... Is there a common set of water parameters that these can share with RCS and still be expected to do well and reproduce? The articles section lists most shrimp as slightly acid and soft water, but I know that at least the CRS are spawned regularly in slightly alkaline water.

If necessary, I can keep the RCS in a separate tank from the system. However, the way my systems are set up are a major time saver on mainenance.

Larry Vires

badflash · Post by **badflash** » Tue Jul 24, 2007 9:38 am

RCS do best in slightly alkaline water. They do well in a wide variety of harness. If you stay close to neutral, they should do fine. I've had no luck with the soft water shrimp, and I keep my RCS in water too hard to measure without dilution with R/O water. I need to acid clean my heaters on a monthy basis to remove ~ 1/4" of scale.

Cactus Bastard · Post by **Cactus Bastard** » Tue Jul 24, 2007 1:22 pm

Have you tried sea sponges? They can support healthy populations of micro-organisms, and would keep them safe from the snails too. The network of holes and tunnels should also provide great places for freshly molted shrimp to hide out.

pleco_breeder wrote:Even algae that I try to culture on rocks in outside tubs as a supplement are picked clean within hours.

Same here, they go completely nuts for an hour or two, but then it's picked clean and they ignore it.

I've got 20W of fluorescent light over a ten gallon tank, and can't even get algae to grow. And I don't even have snails

I've been looking for Oak trees for weeks now, but haven't found any. There are lots of Elm and Poplar, does anybody have opinions on either of those?

badflash · Post by **badflash** » Tue Jul 24, 2007 6:19 pm

Try the poplar. Most hardwood trees should work. I'd steer clear of Elm as there is something in elm sap that is very bitter. No idea if it is harmfull, but I doubt it would be good.

pleco_breeder · Post by **pleco_breeder** » Tue Jul 24, 2007 7:59 pm

The sponge idea is why I added the sponge filter to the tank. I normally have to clean those in my other tanks weekly to get rid of excessive "critters" clogging pores, but can barely tell this one has been used after 8 weeks without a cleaning.

I can definitely understand your position on cleaning scale from heaters. I started using the titanium models after having too many crack because of calcium deposits insulating one part more than another. Even Pyrex tubes can't hold up to it and I've ran higher quality Pyrex up over 600 degrees in the lab with no visible effects.

Larry Vires

Post by **Mustafa** » Tue Jul 24, 2007 10:11 pm

We're all using live food in established tanks. It's called biofilm. It's just that they are microscopic. What kind of food you feed your shrimp, i.e. flake, frozen, live etc., usually isn't the root of problems in a shrimp tank. The microscopic flora and fauna (which serves as food AND takes care of water quality) may just not have matured in your tank yet. That's the root issue.

Cactus Bastard · Post by **Cactus Bastard** » Wed Jul 25, 2007 6:57 am

badflash wrote:Try the poplar. Most hardwood trees should work. I'd steer clear of Elm as there is something in elm sap that is very bitter. No idea if it is harmfull, but I doubt it would be good.

Thanks, I'll try poplar then. I had done a search on both elm and poplar here but nobody had reported using either of them yet.

Cactus Bastard · Post by **Cactus Bastard** » Wed Jul 25, 2007 8:58 pm

I just discovered a mosquito larvae in my tank. Will my cherries eat it? I removed this one at first in case it was a parasite of some kind, but upon closer inspection, it is just a mosquito larvae.
I expect more in the future though, should I try and eliminate any I find, or be happy that the cherries are getting a treat?

pleco_breeder · Post by **pleco_breeder** » Sun Jul 29, 2007 11:11 am

As said, I am updating this thread. I've now been feeding micro worms to the tank for slightly more than 2 weeks. However, I've cut down to every third day because of time constraints due to work. Anyway, it is noteworthy that both females and males in the tank have started showing more of the red color associated with the strain. The males are actually more of a pink color, but that is to be expected.

The ripe females have as yet not spawned, but are definitely ready. I can't verify whether they molted after this past weeks water change, so it is possible that they just weren't ready yet.

It is also notable that the biofilm on the walls of the tank has made a comeback. I am assuming that the population, even though there are only 7 shrimp in the tank, was keeping it eaten down to below the levels of a stable population.

If the tank does stabilize/season, I will probably eventually try stopping the nematode feedings to find out whether the population can sustain without the additional live feedings. Seeing as this is the first noticeable success with this tank, I am probably some time away from trying this though.

Larry Vires