Recently i saw mosquitoes larvae in my shrimp tank and few mosquitoes flying around the tank . So i used my pesticides to spray on the mosquitoes ( flying on top of the tank) and who noes that the chemcial forms a layer on my shrimp tank water... The next day... more than 20 baby rainbow shrimps die... Can someone advice on me what to do? I thinking of dropping this hobby but looking at the remaining shrimps in the tank makes me wanna go on... what should i do?
I can't put fish inside the tank which will eat the larvae of mosquitoes but in return they will eat me shrimp larve too... haix... what should i do? Drop this hobby , put those remaining 40 shrimps in my fish community tank which i belive they will die in less den 1 week or should i put fish in my shrimp tank?
Very sorry to hear that. I don't have any experience on your problem. But let's work it out with our shrimp friends here. Well, is it possible to net away the mosquito larvae and then add a lid to the top of your tank ?
I've heard that a plant (land plant, not water plant) called Mosquito-Repellent Grass in my country works well. Is it possible to grow a pot of it near the tank?
I have read elsewhere on this site that the wild type guppys would be ok for shrimp, but I am not sure if that goes for baby shrimp or not.
If you use anykind of chemical, pesticide, paint, window cleaner etc... you should cover up your tank with something airtight. If you are going to have the tank coverd up for a while, you can run an airpump in a non-contaminated room and just stick the hose and airstone in your tank.
Pretty much any household chemical you use to kill a bug will also kill fish and shrimp.
Sorry for your loss, but do not give up!!!
[EDIT: I forgot to mention, I would reccomend you change 20% of your water concentrating the siphon intake on the surface to try and get as many of the bugs out of the water as possible. If the shrimp handle water changes well, I would say fo a 50 or even 75% change but I dont know much about shrimp, yet.]
Hi, So sorry to hear your loss. I too have been bug by this problem ever since i went "topless" What i did was to create as much water top turbulance as is allowable that the mos larvae will not be able to get O2 from the surface. I used cooling fans and switch my filter to the dolphin top flow filter which sort of distubed the water top quite drastically. What i noticed was that the larvae did not survive for more than 24 hours and died and was sucked into the filter inlet............... i have a net covering my inlet to prevent shrimps being sucked in, so the larvae stuck there. Quite a no of mos tried to lay eggs there too got sucked into the water and ended up on the inlet mouth as well
Of course i observed their progress closely lest the larvae turn into mos, .......... esp. with this dengue epidemic thingy going on around here, you cant be too cautious.
Dont drop this hobby, coz we need more people into this to bring down prices and encourage commercial breeders for more variety and fairer prices!
Well I wouldn't put any fish in your fish tank. The "wild" guppies (mosquito fish) are real aggressive and eat everything. I've only got 4 of them (fish store was going to toss them down the sewer) and they even demolish earthworms (which even the bettas sometimes have trouble dealing with). From what little I kow of mosquitos, don't the females need blood to mature their eggs so if they don't get any blood, the cycle is ended? So if you put a screen top (you can buy netting fabrice at the sewing store fairly cheaply or you can buy screen tops at reptile supply places) on the tank, even if the mosquitos start flying around they can't get out and will eventually die of starvation. The screen top would prevent other mosquitoes from laying new eggs in your tank.
Hardware stores and farming stores sometime sell this stuff called "No-Pest Strip". It's a solid strip that you hang and is supposed to kill flying and crawling insects. Dichlorvos is the active ingredient (I don't know anything about this stuff). This might work but you'd have to do some research to find out if it's ok for fishrooms. My local reptile store even sells it.
51Cornell wrote:Well I wouldn't put any fish in your fish tank. The "wild" guppies (mosquito fish) are real aggressive and eat everything. I've only got 4 of them (fish store was going to toss them down the sewer) and they even demolish earthworms (which even the bettas sometimes have trouble dealing with).
well, i got 10 wild boraras brigittae in my 2ft shrimp only tank and my cherries are still multiplying..... i guess your "mosquito fish" is pretty wild....
kross wrote:well, i got 10 wild boraras brigittae in my 2ft shrimp only tank and my cherries are still multiplying..... i guess your "mosquito fish" is pretty wild....
--That does not mean that the fish are not eating a bunch of shrimp hatchlings still (they are). If there are enough hiding spaces a shrimp population can remain constant or even grow slowly, which is ok with some people. But others want all or most of their hatchlings to survive...in that case these fish would not be all that welcome despite their tiny size.
. So i used my pesticides to spray on the mosquitoes ( flying on top of the tank) and who noes that the chemcial forms a layer on my shrimp tank water... The next day... more than 20 baby rainbow shrimps die... 
Can someone advice on me what to do? I thinking of dropping this hobby but looking at the remaining shrimps in the tank makes me wanna go on... what should i do? 
What i did was to create as much water top turbulance as is allowable that the mos larvae will not be able to get O2 from the surface. I used cooling fans and switch my filter to the dolphin top flow filter which sort of distubed the water top quite drastically. What i noticed was that the larvae did not survive for more than 24 hours and died and was sucked into the filter inlet............... i have a net covering my inlet to prevent shrimps being sucked in, so the larvae stuck there. Quite a no of mos tried to lay eggs there too got sucked into the water and ended up on the inlet mouth as well 
