Mysterious RCS die-off in the midst of Sri Lanka Dwarf Shrim

[Neonshrimp]

I read the post but not the question you had in the picture. I think it would be better to get some more shrimp to improve the chances of the shrimp mating. Are any of the Malaya shrimp saddled, this is the easiest way to know if they are producing eggs.

[Terran]

Oddly enough while I was trying to coax some of the suspect shrimp towards the glass for photos I found an additional shrimp.....so I have four Malayas....(Maybe there is a fifth in there somewhere though I still think its unlikely)


These are pictures of two different shrimp....but I cant tell which ones are the different ones....

The important thing is that do any of the shrimp that appear in these pictures appear to be male???....

[Mustafa]

The last picture on the previous page is a male. So are the first five on this page (above). If the body shape and the less intense coloration is not a giveaway, just look for the three black dots on the side of the abdomen of the shrimp. Those with the dots are males.

[Terran]

*sigh of relief*

Thanks for the verification Mustafa


This means that of the four Malaya I can spot...2 are males and 2 are females.....


I wish they would breed already jeeze ....the Sri Lanka are much smaller and berried already....

[Terran]

Can I retract that sigh of relief
I found a Malaya dead today....Im pretty sure it was a male....

This is really fustrating me because I cant figure out whats going wrong in this tank.....


The Sri Lanka that are in the tank with the Malaya are all berried and acting fine....One has been berried for almost two weeks


The Cherries in the tank suffered some deaths in earlier months but now seem hardy....(I couldnt figure out the cause of these deaths either)


And even the surviving Malaya seem to be behaving regularly.... I noticed no illness or weak behavior prior to this recent death.....




There is an explosive copepod population....and the water parameters seem fine.....



I almost want to move them to another tank but I worry that such a drastic change could cause more harm than help....

I just dont know what to do other than my typical routine and hope for the best....

...*sigh*.... why wont these jerks breed!.....they make it from children to adults without any trouble....and suddenly when they are breeding size they start dying off....

[Terran]

I think something is happening to the tanks water conditions at night. I stayed up tonight because I am studying for a Biochemistry exam and a Neuroscience midterm that I have on monday. Since I have been worried about the shrimp Ive been checking on them about every four hours or so....give or take an hour....Ive checked on them three times tonight....

When I say "I checked on them". I turned on the tank light and looked around at the shrimp and then turned off the light...


Well when I turned on the light the first time one of the Sri Lanka had taken on a sickly whitish type opaqueness...


A couple hours later I checked on them again and the same Sri Lanka looked more opaque and some of the cherries had taken on a whitish hue....


A couple hours later I checked on them again and now two of the Sri Lanka were opaque looking (both berried) and more of the cherries were too....(the Malaya seemed relatively the same).....

and then I recalled that in the mornings when I wake up and turn on this tank's light its not uncommon for shrimp to appear a bit sickly....and then I also remembered that all the deaths were found in the morning....none of them were found when I was turning off the tanks for the night.... I seem to remember someone on this board talking about their water conditions changing during the night due to the vegetation or microorganism activity or something (Ill do some digging)(EDIT: CO2)...


Since that third time I have left the light on...its been nearly two hours....and all but one (that first Sri Lanka) have cleared up and look more healthy...
I almost think I should just leave the light on continuously untill the shrimp have babies...and then distributed them to other tanks....

Ill do some forum searches for that post[done CO2 related]....
In the meantime feel free to comment on my probelms....


Edit:....Hmmmm I do have a lot of algae in this tank maybe too much CO2 is being produced at night....Its pretty dense....I have wanted to pull a lot of it out but Ive been hestitant to remove any large amount in fear that it would be too drastic of a change....High CO2 would explain a lot of these probelms I have been experiancing with this particular tank....


I guess what Ill do is before I turn the light off tonight is pluck out as much of the string algae as I can....and maybe remove the rocks that the dark algae grows all over....

[badflash]

What have you tested the water for?

What is your water source and have you tested it?

[Terran]

My water testing ability is pretty limited because what I have availible to me is the "Quick Dip Test Strips" ....these things test for pH, hardness, alkalinity, nitrite, and nitrate.....And then I also have pH strips.... So theres a lot of error ....but according to those strips everything is fine....


My biological indicators (the copepods and the MTS) are doing very well....the copepods are literally everywhere covering everything.... Im starting to really think its a CO2 thing....because now one of the Malaya shrimp is berried....It just seems odd to me to have every indication during the day like conditions are perfect (berrying shrimp, healthy behavior, thriviing copepod population) and then in the mornings an occasional death/s with a seemingly huge drop in the health of the survivors in the morning.....


I just dont know if it would be best to try and claw out all the string algae and remove the rocks with the dark algae....or just leave the lights on until they have reproduced .....now that I have two Sri Lanka berried and one Malaya berried I feel like if I can just get some offspring I can increase my chances of success.....I have so few left now Im on eggshells....

[badflash]

Leaving the lights on 24/7 will make the algae worse, but should help with the oxygen if thatis the problem. When I had excessive string algae it was because my phosphates were high. This also made it impossible for me to keep shrimp alive. If the sources is not food or ferts, it may be coming in via your water supply. Just a guess.

I would mechanically remove excessive string algae, but not all of it. Do you have any other plants like java moss?

[Terran]

The bottom of the tank is planted with some type of fine aquatic grass that covers most of the substrate....
This is the grass before the string algae invasion you can see it start to appear there in the back though...

The grass has spread out and grown denser since this picture....I suppose since the string algae and this grass coexist so easily that they must not be competing for the same resources very much....
I do have Java moss that I supose I could add to the tank...I also have Egeria Densa...and Java Fern....but I wouldnt know how much would be good though....

I feel like though if I have a CO2/O2 probelm at night that adding more plants could be hazardous


If I do have high phosphates it would have to be from my water source because I dont feed the shrimp nor do I fertlize....

[badflash]

Do you use hardwood leaves in your tank? Leached hardwood leaves remove phosphates and nitrates and will start out the BBA. The shrimp love them too.

[Terran]

I used to use Oak leaves but I eventually stopped because I had not noticed any remarkable difference in the tank without them....
I suppose I could start soaking some for use in this tank.....

[Cactus Bastard]

You can increase the surface agitation of your water to outgas the excess CO2

[Terran]

I use a Whisper Power Filter which agititates the water a bit....I had not really thought of using an air stone....because I just hate those things...they look so unnatural.... ....But if its for the life of the shrimp I could try it.....