How long does it take for a RCS to molt?

[Cactus Bastard]

Cactus
The Gap that you see in Mustafa's picture is the seperation of the exoskelton. You could say this is where the Shrimp is jointed.
And this is where, the shrimp will pop out of its skin, when it molts.
John

Yeah, I eventually realized that; and boy what a relief that was.
The problem with my shrimp is when that joint becomes extended for whatever reason.
I observed last night that one of my shrimp had an extended gap, and he wasn't even acting strange. It just looked so bizarre, and it was the first time I had even noticed the gap; I was greatly concerned. A few hours later it was dead. Then I noticed another shrimp that had the same condition,

and the following morning it could barely move. At first I drew the incorrect conclusion that there wasn't supposed to be any gap at all, and I thought a LOT of my shrimp were completely doomed.
The fact that this problem we're having is manifesting itself along the line where a shrimp would normally exit it's old shell when molting is good evidence that this problem is related to molting.

I may have copper in my water. I went to three pet stores after work tonight, and none of them actually had a Cu+ test kit
I did at least get some copper adsorbing filter media. I doubt it could hurt anything, so I put it in my filter. If I do have high levels of copper in my water, this will help. I just don't know how quickly it works, and I'm sweating bullets here

[Suzie Q]

Cactus
The Gap that you see in Mustafa's picture is the seperation of the exoskelton. You could say this is where the Shrimp is jointed.
And this is where, the shrimp will pop out of its skin, when it molts.

Suzie Q
If a Adult RCS female does not have a saddled or carrying eggs all of the time, she is not happy
If the shrimp do not like the water they are in , they will not breed, they will not carry eggs, they may not even have a saddle.

The multi-colored rock or the piece of wood may be leaching something into the water .

I myself have never seen the problem you are having and I do not use any of the chemicals listed in this thread, so I can not say if they are the cause.

You may want to try and remove the rock & Wood and see if this helps.

You should not have a problem with older shrimp breeding or if you have just a few males.

I have had just 1 male with 10 females and he had his work cut for himself, but I still had breeding and offspring.

John

John...the rock maybe, but the wood I have had for a long time soaking (it came off a huge piece I bought about 4 or 5 months ago...it finally quit leaching, and then that small piece fell off. All my females are saddled, and have been for a while (that is why I don't understand why I don't have babies yet)...I guess I am going to give up on breeding them (maybe then they will) LOL. Maybe I will tear the entire tank down to bear minimum and see if anything good happens.

[Cactus Bastard]

Updates and summary of my molting issues. The female I showed you died the day after I noticed her. Since I noticed the gaps among my shrimp, I've had five deaths. Three were shrimp with severe gapping, one of them looked normal, but I don't know about the very first, it had been partially consumed when I found it.

Here's my timeline, I left out most of the details that I don't think are important:

Tuesday evening, I spent a couple hours watching them closely, and taking hundreds of photos; they were looking and acting fine.

Wednesday evening, there is one (older) partially consumed dead one, and I notice a fairly young one with the gap - she dies a few hours later. A third (older) shrimp is badly gapped, but acting normal, swimming around, grazing etc. A few others are moderately gapped. I perform two successive water changes with Prime to dilute the Aquaclear treated water in case that was actually a problem.

Thursday morning, the third shrimp is nearing death, can barely move. A (younger) shrimp had molted successfully though.

Thursday evening, another successful molt, but the third shrimp has died. The remaining gapped shrimp are looking a little better (I think). There is only one that still looks downright bad. I add a bag of copper remover.

Friday morning, another successful molt, this was one of the older ones.

Friday evening, the one in bad shape is looking much worse. (The shell looks the same, but her behaviour is terrible). A little later friday evening, there is another molt. I'm not sure which shrimp molted.

Saturday morning, The shrimp who was in grave shape last night has died. She had been the only one left with the extra large gap.

Saturday evening, there is another molt, and a fresh death. There is nothing visibly wrong with the corpse.

Sunday Morning, another successful molt.

Sunday evening, another successful molt (fairly small).

Monday morning, two more successful molts.

Monday evening, an unsuccessful molt - the front half of his shell is still attached.

Tuesday morning, two more molts, the one with the molting problems is still around, but not doing well.

Tuesday evening, two more molts (yikes), and the one with the molting problems is doing better?

Wednesday, No molts, no deaths.

Thursday, No molts, no deaths

edited again for updates

[Suzie Q]

Cactus Bastard...how are your shrimp today?

I have had a female molt successively (well, all 6 males were zooming around the tank). I think I have figured out which ones molt, because as the males are zooming, there is usually 1 female hiding in that multicolored rock...as the male passes, she moves to where he "can't see her". The others are grazing in the tank.

Speaking of the rock...it was suggested that it may be leaching something into the tank. The rock was bought at a lfs, and I boiled it for 5-10 minutes, then let it cool, then attached the Java Moss, and then put it in the tank...I just used untreated tap water to boil it in...should it have been treated?

[Cactus Bastard]

I just used untreated tap water to boil it in...should it have been treated?

I have a strong suspicion that my problems have been caused by copper in my water supply. If you boiled the rock in tap water, you started with HOT tap water, correct? This would have had much more copper than cold tap water would have, and boiling it would infuse the rock with these higher concentrations. Do you know if there's copper in your water? I haven't tested mine yet, been working twelve hour days, as well as looking after a baby kitten. I miss sleep.

I had another molt in the tank on Friday morning, and then on friday evening, another one molted. (I missed it by about ten minutes, what a shame. I was watching the tank, then went to have a shower. When I came back, there was a very fresh molt still in a single piece, and crawling with shrimp. Then on Sunday morning, there was a dead one. I don't know if it's the one that molted or not, or whether the one with the bad gap is still alive. I could not find it this morning, but it was very hard to find last night too; I could have missed it.

[Cactus Bastard]

Haven't tested the current copper levels from my tap, but I got some reports on our water water quality levels for the past few years.

in 2006, copper ranged from 0.0005mg/L - 0.0039 mg/L
in 2005, copper ranged from 0.001mg/L - 0.003mg/L
in 2004, copper ranged from 0 - 0.004 mg/L
in 2003, copper ranged from 0 - 0.003mg/L
Assuming our copper usually tops out at around 0.004mg/L Is that a dangerous level? I've no idea.

mg/L is identical to ppm by the way.

There were a few other heavy metals that may be cause for concern:

Chromium was kind of high sometimes too
2005, and 2006 were pretty low, but:
in 2004 it got up to 0.008mg/L
in 2003 it got up to 0.005mg/L

Iron spiked kind of high a couple times (hit 0.100mg/L in 2005), as did Cadmium (0.0005mg/L in 2005)

Also, the tank is several years old, so heavy metals could have been building up in the substrate over the years? I'm pretty sure I've never had to medicate that tank, but I did use hot water when I did water changes. Actually, I used PURE HOT to do my water changes for years, to remove dissolved gasses quickly.. Probably a really bad idea in hindsight

I'm pretty much convinced that my problems have been caused by heavy metals, which the water conditioner was not dealing with properly. I think the switch to prime and the addition of the cutrisorb should fix things, it's just a matter of how long the shrimp take to recover.

[Suzie Q]

Is there a test that I can buy to test for copper? I normally start out with cold water, and have let the tap run for a minute or two to let any settlement wash out of the lines. I may have gotten a jumpstart with hot water.

I had another successful molt again (can not find exo, but the boys are on the move again). I started feeding 1/3 of an algae wafer every 2-3 days. I wonder if my breeding problem is due to lack of food? I know when the tank gets over populated, the females will not produce. I will continue the feeding schedule for a month and see if I have any babies.

Thanks for all advice.

Cactus Bastard, good luck with your shrimp. I hope you don't have anymore deaths in your tank.

[Cactus Bastard]

Yes, I saw one in a pet store on Wednesday, made by API. But then I tried three different pet stores on Thursday, and none of them carried it. What I did find was very cool, and probably worth getting for anybody who keeps shrimp. It is a small packet of media that adsorbs copper, lead, and some other heavy metals. It was only around $20, and basically lasts forever. It changes color when it starts to get saturated, and can then be recharged at home fairly simply. It will remove anything that may happen to leach out of your substrates, ornaments, driftwood etc.

Live plants might not be too happy when you remove all the copper though, isn't that a common ingredient in fertilizer? Hmm...

Did your read my update post? I've been continually updating it; they've been molting like crazy. I know that's not always a good thing, but in this case I think it is.

[Cactus Bastard]

Also, even if your water supply does not contain much copper, and you're taking the proper precautions, copper could still get into your tank through other means. Certain foods or fertilizers can contain copper, or they could have had residue on them from the grower? And maybe they could contain heavy metals within the plants themselves that would not come off by rinsing, but could leach into your water slowly? Lead is a possibility also, the plants could have been weighted down by lead before you got them; this could have been absorbed by the plants.

Sorry I've got more questions thatn answers there, hopefully other people here can answer them.. Can you get a water quality report from your water company? I was able to find mine online.

[Cactus Bastard]

That rock of yours could be leaching iron too. Iron oxide is by far the most common source of the color red in rocks. If it were my tank, I'd remove it, and anything else that may seem possibly dangerous. Once your shrimp are healthy again, you could add things back in one at a time and monitor closely for any negative changes. Don't remove a bunch of plants at once though, as that can effect your waste system; you could spike.

Edit: I was just reading through again, and noticed that you bought that rock at a pet store. Is it artificial? In the pictures it looks quite natural, but it could just be well aged. I remember seeing rocks like that in the petstore, except they were much more pink. If it came from a pet store I would tend to trust it a bit more.

[Cactus Bastard]

Crap. More molting problems - I'll probably have another death to report shortly.. This guy only managed half a molt. The front half came part way off, but is still attached. He must have been fighting it for some time, since it looks like he's about given up now It's kind of hard to tell in the picture, as there's no depth, but the entire shell is raised off his body a considerable degree.


I don't think there's anything I can do at this point. I think I've solved their water conditions, but I can't do a thing about the heavy metals that have already accumulated in their bodies... I'm trying really hard to be patient and wait it out, but this is so damn frustrating.

[Suzie Q]

That rock of yours could be leaching iron too. Iron oxide is by far the most common source of the color red in rocks. If it were my tank, I'd remove it, and anything else that may seem possibly dangerous. Once your shrimp are healthy again, you could add things back in one at a time and monitor closely for any negative changes. Don't remove a bunch of plants at once though, as that can effect your waste system; you could spike.

Edit: I was just reading through again, and noticed that you bought that rock at a pet store. Is it artificial? In the pictures it looks quite natural, but it could just be well aged. I remember seeing rocks like that in the petstore, except they were much more pink. If it came from a pet store I would tend to trust it a bit more.

.....sorry, internet issues...

Yes the rock is natural. I got it at Petco. I have seen them at my local Mom and Pops store, but Petco was having a sale on them.

As far as copper, this is an older established neighborhood. I do not think copper is leaching into the water (I could be wrong though). I do not use ferts, or food w/copper in it...hard to find, but I always read the labels! and I do not use hot/warm water to change my tanks. My plants came from the forums, but the "grower" may have used ferts on them (Java Fern/Moss), but I am not sure.

So far (knock on wood), I have not had another problem. Does your latest shrimp have the same degree as mine did (molted upper)?

[Cactus Bastard]

The one with the molting problems seems to be getting better? It appears he was able to shed the rest of his carapace (though I did not find it in the tank), but it looks like it tore off a small section of his new shell with it. I'll try and get a better picture to explain better.

[Baby_Girl]

it tore off a small section of his new shell with it.

I had a bamboo shrimp that had that happen. The poor thing survived for a couple weeks after it, even with a large chunk of flesh exposed It eventually died but was a champion, even continuing to feed. I now add iodide to my shrimp tanks. Don't know if it helps or not, but makes me feel better. I use iodiDe because it's much less toxic than iodine (the antiseptic).

[Cactus Bastard]

We'll have to wait and see how this guy does. Quite the trooper so far, swimming all over the place, eating and grazing.

It's been two days now, no molts, no deaths

I'm hoping my tank is stabilized? They are all acting normal, eating well etc.