Shrimps dying HELP!

[51Cornell]

I'm kind of new to the pet shrimp hobby myself. Have you been adding calcium and iodine to help them keep their shells in good health? Do they have enough food? What else is in the tank? Etc.

[winwin]

Hello,

Everything sounds ok to me, did u "level" the water (ie. mix the tank's water with shrimp's original water) before putting the shrimp in the tank? Try this next time, it will help.

[Shrimphead]

Hi guys,

I am a new member in this forum and I am very happy to join you guys in the discussion on shrimps.

I am currently facing some problems. Within 2 days, I have Casualties of

5 Tiger shrimp
2 baby and 1 juvenile and 1 adult cherry shrimps
1 Blue Shrimp( If thats what they are call )

Water Temp : 28C
PH: 7
KH : 5
Ammonia : 0

I have also faced problems with my cherries dying with the same synthoms. Attached is the picture of a sample shrimp. Please do take note of the breaking up of the shell from the neck portion. Please do advice me on this matter. Thanks all in advance.

Ok....I do not know how to attach a picture here also. Please advise also.

[drhooha]

can you give a little more information? Did you add all the shrimp at once? Are these all newly added or have they been in there for a while and suddenly started dying?

Can you check nitrites? That's another possible factor.

[Shrimphead]

The shrimps have been for some time already and I breed them since they were born but about 3 weeks ago I revamp my whole tank as the KH and PH of my shrimp tank was about 9 each. Found out that my gravel are coral chips and I quickly changed the gravel and in the mean while I migrated them to a big tub with 60% old water and 40% new water. I left my tank to run for 3 days and finally migrated the shrimps back as they are not doing too well in the tub. Noticed a few deaths already. The first 2 weeks were fine but at the 3rd week I noticed that my shrimps started to die. I tested PH 7 and KH 5 and also no ammonia in the water. Temp is 28C. But up till now I still see a couple of dead shrimps in a day. Any idea whats wrong? IN desperate help before more dies. Please do advise. Thanks.

Haven't get the nitrate test kit yet tho. How does nirate in water affect the shrimps.

[drhooha]

shrimp can be sensitive to nitrItes, check for that if you can
if you changed around your gravel, you may have affected your biological filter. If that's the case, you may be undergoing a 'mini-cycle' while the bacteria converting ammonia and nitrites build back up

at the very least i would try frequent, small water changes (30-50% every day or every other day) and see if that helps....

[Shrimphead]

Thanks so much for your advise. I will do just that and see whether the condition will improve.

[BlueEL]

I started having the problem that Shrimphead described below. My Cherry and Red Nose are dying slowly. It started with the shell cracked open between the head and body. And then the shrimp stopped eating, and then eventually turned white and died. I dosed 1 drop of Kent iodine weekly. Does anybody knows what is the problem? Thank you!

Here's the water parameters:
Tank size: 5.5
Ammonia: 0
Nitrate: 0
PH: 7.6

I have also faced problems with my cherries dying with the same synthoms. Attached is the picture of a sample shrimp. Please do take note of the breaking up of the shell from the neck portion. Please do advice me on this matter. Thanks all in advance.

Ok....I do not know how to attach a picture here also. Please advise also.

[Bradimus]

It started with the shell cracked open between the head and body.

Can you post a picture of this?

I dosed 1 drop of Kent iodine weekly.

In all likelihood, this is unecessarily and does nothing to benefit your shrimp.

[Mustafa]

BlueEl,

You're probably feeding too much. Or...if you bought the shrimp recently, they could be "pre-damaged" because they were kept under terrible conditions at the dealer's tanks.

In any case....to a large water change and *stop* feeding. Don't give them anything at all. They'll be fine....

As for the Iodine....Brad is right....save yourself the money on the bottle of Iodine. There is no scientific evidence that the shrimp can just "suck it up" through their skin. There are sufficient amounts of everything they need in the foods they eat.

Mustafa

[BlueEL]

Unfortunately I dont have a picture of them. If I see another one with this problem I will take a picture of it. The reason I started dosing iodine is because my ghost shrimps stopped turning white and died after I started using it.

Thank you!

It started with the shell cracked open between the head and body.

Can you post a picture of this?

I dosed 1 drop of Kent iodine weekly.

In all likelihood, this is unecessarily and does nothing to benefit your shrimp.

[BlueEL]

Hi Mustafa,

I have stopped feeding them for more than a week already. I will continue to do so, and see if there will be fewer deaths. Most of the shrimps have been in the tank for almost 2 months. They were eating well and active until they started turning white. This happens usually after they molted for a few days. Could it be that they couldn’t form their shell properly (because lack of calcium?) and then infected by virus?

Btw, I have noticed some kind of bugs living on top of the duckweeds. They are red and very tiny. When I tried to touch it with a tooth pick, they would bounced away very fast. I am wondering if these little bugs would release some harmful chemical to the water which leads to shrimp deaths.

Thanks,

BlueEL

As for the Iodine....Brad is right....save yourself the money on the bottle of Iodine. There is no scientific evidence that the shrimp can just "suck it up" through their skin. There are sufficient amounts of everything they need in the foods they eat.

You guys probably are right. I think I should stop dosing Iodine and save a few bucks.

[/quote]

[BlueEL]

I have found a picture of a cherry shrimp which has the exact same problem. You can see there's a crack on near the head. I have read that someone said its because the water is too hard. Any comments or suggestions?
http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sra ... 44b084.jpg

Thank you!