Cardinal Shrimp

[dagray]

took this tonight with a Sigma 180mm macro lens and extension tubes using the camera's onboard flash... Pentax K7 1/90 sec ISO 800, F 11

from the dedicated 20 gallon tank which is nothing but Cardinal shrimp. It is being filtered with a Tetra Whisper HOB for 30-45 gallon tanks using a pair of panty hose as a pre-filter on the pickup tube.

Dave

[chinamon]

nice! ive been wanting to buy a 100mm macro for my 7D but i need a 70-200 f/2.8L IS a little more (and i still cant afford that yet)

[dagray]

Get the lens you want, the 70-200 f2.8 and buy a set of extension tubes... you will be suprized at how the extension tubes change your minimum focusing distance to allow you the advantages of the zoom without having to buy a macro lens.

Dave

[dagray]

Here is the 20 gallon tank for my cardinal shrimp, set up with lace rock, Amazon sword just to have a plant in there, Whisper HOB filter for 30-40 gallon tank with panty hose over intake strainer,
http://i211.photobucket.com/albums/bb27 ... G15871.jpg
and the Shrimp
http://i211.photobucket.com/albums/bb27 ... rimp-1.jpg
Taken with 70-300mm Tamron lens with macro at the 180-300mm range on extension tubes

Dave

[Mustafa]

Please keep reporting about your shrimp. I would like to see how they fare in your tank given that they are wild-caught. By the way, I merged your two essentially same topics together so we have all information in one place.

[dagray]

Please keep reporting about your shrimp. I would like to see how they fare in your tank given that they are wild-caught.

I asked if they were wild caught or tank raised and was told "tank raised" but.... I really think you are correct as they came from Hong Kong via New York.

There is one individual in Texas claiming to raise them and selling them 10 at a time.

I usually see a few in the early morning or at night, or if I pick up a 6 x 2 x3 inch rock and turn it over I can count three to 5 shrimp and then see other shrimp through crevices in the rock. I used Lace Rock, Lava Rock, and a piece of light (yellow) colored porous rock.

Dave

[dagray]

On the night of the 20th of June (I recieved the shrimp on 13 Jun) I went digging in the tank and removed the rock and put it in a bucket. Before I took any of the rock out I double and tripple checked to make sure it was shrimp free. I then was dismayed to find at least 20 dead shrimp (which I removed) I did see a very few live shrimp, and one came up out of the gravel (1/4 -5/8 tank gravel) and suprizingly one was on the lace rock in the bucket and when I went to get it in the tank without the rock it went into a hole in the rock.

All of the rock is in the tank, and I have seen at least three last night, and I found one hanging upside down on the rock this morning eating away.

I recieved this E-mail from a guy in Texas when I inquired as to his Cardinal shrimp:

Hi David,
I rarely feed my shrimps with wafers or flakes. Actually, I don't use any special food for Cardinals. They eat very little. When I set up my first aquarium with Cardinals (it was a standard 55 gal, there were about 20-25 shrimps), I didn't feed them for whole generation. I tried, they didn't eat offered food. They picked something from surfaces in the tank, from sponge filter, from dead leaves, stones, gravel, driftwood etc. Only when there were over 300 shrimps in the tank, they started showing some weak interest to offered food.

I feed all my shrimps with boiled zucchini, canned green beans, Romaine lettuce, crushed snails, Tetra color granules, and sometimes with fish flakes, algae wafers etc. Most often used food is my home made one, canned green beans and boiled zucchini. The food I prepare is made of boiled spinach, boiled zucchini, boiled green beans, boiled green peas, boiled carrots, Spirulina and Chlorella powder, raw shrimps, raw sea fish, some vitamins and fixed with agar-agar, then frozen.

They were shy if there were not many of them. When there are many of them, they don't hide at all. Also as I noticed, they are much braver if there are some Sulawesi snails. I keep them with orange Rabbit snails. Now they just step aside if I dip a net to catch them.

I have six gold spotted Sulawesi Rabbit snails and Six White spotted Sulawesi Rabbit Snails ariving today (one variety for the Cardinal shrimp tank and one for the mixed shrimp tank [Cherry shrimp, Amano shrimp, Asian Filter shrimp]) My shrimp tanks are fish free.


As a side note one of the Cardinals is about 1.5 inches long and very fat that is a survivor and I am seeing shed exoskeletons.
Dave

[dagray]

This morning (26 June 2012) at 09:30 I saw the tail of one as it was hanging upsidedown in a cave created with the rock in the tank. The tail was bobbing as it was probably eating algae.

Dave

[Mustafa]

Sounds like they are wild-caught for sure. Unfortunately, the dead ones you discovered are probably not the only ones that died. With shipments like that the majority dies and you're lucky if even one is alive after a month or two. The shrimp are simply in really bad shape when they arrive in the US..and get stressed out even more when shipped to you. These guys are even more sensitive to organic pollution in the water than your average shrimp, so even just a little bit of overfeeding can be a death sentence for them.

[gerd]

She looks lovely. How is she faring in your current tank?

Hi Mustafa,
we made an import from Aristocratama via A.-Holland. My part of that shipment were
20 Yellow Noses. Within the last 3 weeks 10 died. 4 are carring eggs now.
Interesting was the water conductance, instead of abt. 200 us we measured 800 us.
The exporters don't care abt. those details. But one fact made us hopeful for better import
results. Every single shrimp was packed in a litte plastic bag with 50 ml of water.
We ordered them likewise.
I am running 6 tanks, 50 l each, for Sulawesi shrimps.
Regards Gerd

[Mustafa]

Hi Gerd,

I'm glad that you received shrimp that were packed much better than the average shipment. I really hope that your shrimp survive and do well. As for microsiemens....the sulawesi shrimp don't really care about microsiemens...they don't care about ph, either, as long as the water is alkaline. That's been my experience so far....

[gerd]

Mustafa,
due to the very different values of tap water in Germany we use RO water and mineral salt 8,5 with increasing success in breeding Sulawesi shrimps.
That means that abt. 200 to 250 microsiemens are recommended.
Regards Gerd

[Mustafa]

Hi Gerd,

I know. RO water is never a bad option for any shrimp actually, as long as a calcium carbonate buffer is provided. The problem in Germany is not the ph or conductivity, but the fact that lots of water supplies have high nitrates and phosphates, and the refusal of most German aquarists to use dechlorinators. The nitrates and phosphates increase the organic load in the water, and the chlorine slowly poisons the shrimp (and the nitrifying bacteria). Just letting the water sit there does not get rid of all of the chlorine, either.

In any case, I'm lucky enough to have no nitrates or phosphates in my water supply. My water comes out out of the tap at 800-1000 microsiemens and a ph of > 8. All I do is dechlorinate the water and lower kh from about 5 to 6 to about 1 to 2 (which, of course, lowers the ph.). I breed both Sulawesi shrimp (from the lakes and the rivers) and high grade CRS, Tiger and bumblebee shrimp in the *same* water.

It would be great if you could document your experience with the Sulawesi shrimp in a separate thread. The more people describe their experiences with these shrimp, the better.

[dagray]

All of the cardinals imported from a person in Hong Kong died. I waited a few weeks and bid on some from Texas (a lot of 10) and eventually won, and then bid on a lot of 10 from California and won so now there are 19 (one died the day after I recieved it) in the tank.

I took the sellers advice from Texas and didn't feed them to let them eat the bio-film and what ever it is they eat out of the tank (they don't seem to eat the algae either). This was three weeks ago and I have found no other dead, in fact I have been finding two or more sheds from them molting per day the last couple days. I did put some pellets designed to feed crustaceans in the tank last night and noticed that the Cardinals don't actively seek out offered food but might eat it if they come across it (one of the larger shrimp was eating a pellet that almost landed on it).

I have also changed the intake on the Tetra whisper power filter by putting a sponge filter over the intake screen and a pair of panty hose over the sponge filter. Also I weekly take one to three gallons of water out of the tank when I syphon any pond snails out of the tank, and get rid of any snail poop I find. I replace the syphoned water with filtered water that has had a double dose of Stress Coat plus put in it and let sit for a day or two to make the absence of chlorine/chloramine/amonia/etc... an absolute certainty.

Dave

[Mustafa]

As you found out, imported shrimp are mostly doomed. Even badly packaged shrimp that are not imported usually die off one by one. Seems like you got luck and ran into someone (in Texas) who actually packages well. His advice about not feeding (or not feeding much at all) is also spot on. That advice applies to all shrimp species, but especially to species that come from extremely oligotrophic (= nutrient poor) environments like the sulawesi shrimp from the big lakes. Well, good luck with these guys and keep reporting back!