New tank checklist

[Kinetikx]

Hello everyone, I'm new to shrimp, but not new to aquariums. I've always kept freshwater, but its been about a decade since I've had a tank running so I'm a bit rusty. I'm using this experience as a jumping off point before I decide if I want to eventually start a reef tank.

I'm in the process of gathering everything together so I've decided to come to the experts to make sure I haven't forgotten anything.

I'm going to be using a 16 gallon Biorb. (I've always used traditional rectangular glass and wanted something different, and also want a smaller footprint since its going to be kept in my bedroom).

The supplies I already have are:
Instant Ocean sea salt
Red lava for substrate- about pea sized **edit* I found black bonsai soil in a nice coarse size that looks better*
Rocks (Lava, sandstone, dry fossilized coral)
API "quick start" for cycling
API 5-in-1 test strips (see below for my plans to get Salifert test kits)
Black sea fan skeleton
Marimo moss balls (just because I think they're interesting)
API "algae eater" wafers
Omega One "veggie rounds"

Things I'm planning to buy:
Milwaukee digital refractometer
Salifert test kits (ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, pH)
Water. Either distilled or RO/DI
Macroalgae
TDS meter
Shrimp (well duh, but I don't know how many yet)

Now here are some questions I have for down the road:
-I'm assuming that the LED lights included with the Biorb are rather weak. Should I consider something more powerful in order to grow algae better? The tank is going to be about 21 inches deep/tall and I'm thinking they weren't thinking people actually wanted to grow algae.

-Should I really concern myself over using either distilled or RO/DI water? I know that reef aquarium people prefer RO/DI and it may not be a huge issue with Opae Ula, but would either provide any benefit over another in this sort of tank?

-How many shrimp would be good to start with, and how many could a 16 gallon eventually support? I'm assuming starting with the maximum amount isn't the best idea.


So that's what I have planned so far. Any glaring omissions or bad choices? I'm trying to do things correct from the start, and some of these choices may be overkill but remember that my eventual goal is to start a reef tank.

Thanks for reading this ramble

[AndyH]

Hey there! I haven't been on these forums in months but I saw your topic and I wanted to give you some kind of reply! Haha. I know when I first started, I was eagerly awaiting help.
First thing I notice is that the 16gallon seems a bit big as a starter tank. I started with a 3gallon and 50 shrimp and it still isn't anywhere near capacity almost 10 months later. I could probably fit like 200-300 in there? I'm thinking you'd have an expensive start up cost if you wanted to get enough shrimp for your 16gallon that you could actually see them when you looked at the tank.
Second thing is that when I was active on these forums, Mustafa warned not to use the marimo moss balls in the brackish water because they would slowly die off.
Third, you may not need the digital refractometer. I have the basic plastic thing that you pour water in to measure specific gravity and it works fine. But if you want an easier, more expensive tool, I know others use the digital refractometer.
I use distilled water and have no problems. I just get the gallon jugs from Publix or Walmart or wherever.
Definitely get the macroalgae and snails from this site and let them sit in the tank for a week or more. It's an anxious waiting game but when you finally put the shrimp in, you'll know that the tank is ready for them.
As far as the light, I've got a white CFL bulb in a Walmart lamp with the moveable arms. It works fine but I'm sure there are other options for a tank that is so much bigger than mine.
Finally, good luck and have fun and take pictures

[Kinetikx]

Thanks for the reply.

Yeah, I know its overkill, but I've always been a fan of larger volumes of water in an aquarium. And the digital refractometer is more for future use when I start a reef tank. Plus, I used one of those swingarm hydrometers for a while and I never felt confident in the readings.

[Mustafa]

I'll chime in, too. The moss ball could definitely be a problem depending on what species of algae it is. Having said that...I have small moss balls growing in one of my Opae tanks. They spontaneously appeared, so I don't think that they are the same species as what's commonly available in stores.

It does not matter if you use RO or DI...makes no difference to these shrimp. As for number of shrimp to start out with...it really does not matter. Just make sure you get enough so that there are males and females present. I usually start out my breeding tanks (10 and 20 gallon tanks) with about 30 animals..but that's an arbitrary number. After a few years I end up with over 1000 animals. The number beneficial bacteria grow with the number of shrimp, so it's not advisable to just throw in a thousand shrimp into any given tank. You will have tons of deaths that way.

The LED in the biorb may actually be just fine. Just start the tank and see how it goes...if you don't have algae after 2-3 months, then maybe you can upgrade. I'm pretty sure that you will end up having plenty of algae growth on all kinds of surfaces. The macroalgae from this site need very little light to grow, too.

Make sure to post some pictures.

[Kinetikx]

Thanks for the info. So far things are going well. Just filled the tank yesterday and started the cycle.

A couple things for anyone else who reads this so they won't make the same mistakes I did:
If you're doing a fishless cycle just buy the "janitorial strength" ammonia from Ace hardware. I bought some grocery store brand ammonia (no surfactants, scents, colors) but the concentration was ridiculously low. I put 350 drops in and the level barely reached 0.5 ppm. I wasted HOURS last night doing this by adding 30, then 50, then another 50 etc. Waiting, and then testing after each addition until I couldn't take it anymore and went to bed. I went to Ace today and bought the real stuff. 80 drops later and I'm already at 2ppm.

Secondly, the Salifert ammonia test is probably great for maintenance testing, but it only goes up to 2ppm. I want around 3ppm for the cycle. So I had to buy an API liquid test kit that goes to 8ppm. That's what I get for not researching fully. But hey, now I've got enough tests to last me for quite a while.

I ended up getting an Ecoray par38 led bulb (lightly used) from eBay. It's 15 watts with a mix of blue and white LED's. I was afraid it would be too blue but it ended up being perfect and I'm sure I'll end up growing plenty of algae/macro algae. BTW, the Chaetomorpha I bought from you Mustafa is doing well, even after having to sit in the bag a couple days longer than I planned. I had to wait for a couple things before I set up the tank.

As far as the moss balls go, I may try to acclimate one to brackish and add it at some point as an experiment. If it doesn't do well I'll just keep the other two that I have in one of my many small spare aquariums I have left over from my days of keeping tarantulas.

Enough of all that though. Pictures are in order





Don't mind all the bubbles. I have a bigger than stock air pump on the tank right now turned way up to move lots of water while I'm mixing in the ammonia.

And anyone that knows these tanks will notice that I've mostly ditched the weird ceramic substrate and modified the tank so I could add more coarse lava rock at the bottom. Both to bring the level higher to give me more surface area for bigger rocks, and for more biological filtration. Heh, those rocks are huuuuuuge. They (and all the substrate) displaced about two gallons. So its more of a 14 gallon Biorb at this point

[Mustafa]

That's a great looking tank! Thanks for the picture.

[Kinetikx]

Well here's an interesting development. The chaetomorpha has been doing great. Until I came home yesterday. Suddenly it had started to look like it was turning brown, either that or its growing algae on it. There is a pretty good crop of green algae starting to grow on most surfaces. When I noticed the color I gently "brushed off" the chaeto. The only thing that came off was shreds of the chaeto about a half inch to inch long pieces.

I have been doing my fishless cycle with ammonia at around 3-4ppm. And I have to stress "about". My Salifert test doesn't go that high, and the API test chart jumps from 2ppm to 4ppm to 8ppm. And the API tests aren't exactly renowned for their precision.

I'm getting the feeling that my ammonia level may be too high. I'm contemplating doing a water change to bring the ammonia lower.

As an aside my nitrite levels are barely perceptible at the moment at .01ppm. It started showing up about two days ago. I'm 10 days into the cycle.

*edit* I've been keeping the temperature for the cycle at 83-84 degrees F. I have read that chaeto can handle up to 86. Though that is probably an upper limit and probably not ideal. Just throwing that out there as a possible reason for my issue.

[Mustafa]

It's probably your ammonia levels. With shrimp, if you really want to do a fishless cycle, you don't need to go crazy with the ammonia levels as these guys don't produce that much ammonia to begin with (even hundreds of them) and you do not need that many nitrifying bacteria to take care of things. At most 1 ppm of ammonia would have probably been more than enough to cycle your tank. Plus, I really don't think a fishless cycle is necessary for Supershrimp. If you start your tank with Chaeto and snails to begin with the tank is usually ready within 2-8 weeks anyway (i.e. when you see algae growth). This species of Chaetomorpha is different from all the others out there, so what you read about other species does not apply to this one necessarily. This one can take both extreme heat and cold, so I don't think that the heat was necessarily the issue. Unless your Chaetomorpha completely melts away it should be able to recover from the broken pieces...even tiny ones.

[Kinetikx]

Thanks again for the information. Just when I think im getting a handle on this stuff again I end up screwing up. I guess I took a little too much time off from the hobby.

I did a 25% water change yesterday to bring ammonia levels down. I'm in the 1-2ppm range now. I'll hopefully see an improvement in the chaeto. Quite a lot of the chaeto broke off when I refilled the tank. I'll end up having to do a small water change again in a couple days to get rid of the broken/dead pieces of the chaeto so I don't end up with even more ammonia introduced if the broken bits start to decompose. I'll leave whatever I siphon out in a bucket to see if I can get it to grow again.

On a positive note I'm starting to see nitrAtes now. The level is about 2.5ppm so the cycle is starting to chug along. The strange thing is I never got a spike in nitrite levels. They've stayed barely perceptible to nonexistant (depending on which test I use). After doing some reading this isn't unheard of. I'm debating whether to get about 20 of the brackish snails you sell here and let them finish out the cycle. I imagine I'd have to do a big water change to bring ammonia down to nothing if it hasn't already dropped to that already (wishful thinking that my cycle will have finished magically by then).

And I've started to do a slow drip acclimation of the marimo. I'm dripping 1.010sg water at the rate of about one drop every 5 seconds into a bucket with a flourescent tube over it. After 6 days I'm at 1.008sg. So far the marimo is showing no negative change. As a sort of control experiment I put a small piece of it into the main tank and it did slightly bleach so the acclimation may be working well. I'll leave the marimo in the bucket for a while once I hit my target salinity of 1.010 to see how they do long term.

[Mustafa]

How is your tank doing?

[Kinetikx]

Creeping along quite well. I've added a few nerite snails in addition to the snails I got from you. They're some small "tapestry" nerites from the Caribbean and have rather pretty shells. I'm quite happy with your snails but they were just so small in this (relatively large) tank that they became nearly invisible. I do like sitting in front of the tank trying to find as many as I can... I can spend plenty of relaxing minutes playing that game I do look forward to them being large enough to identify as either/or Tarebia granifera or Melanoides tuberculata. And so far the second batch of chaetomorpha is looking good. In another week or so I'll be confident that it really was the ammonia levels that contributed to the previous batch's decline. The ammonia levels are sitting at .25ppm and holding. I think I'm about ready for some shrimp

[Mustafa]

Good. Just keep in mind that your nerite may be a little too good at eating algae, which may negatively effect the whole system (i.e. less growth for shrimp to eat).

[Kinetikx]

Yeah, I've been monitoring how they've been attacking the algae. And yes they are incredibly efficient. I bought the smallest ones I could (around 1/4 inch) and they are really good at making zig zag swaths of absolutely clean acrylic. I was already thinking that I'll only keep one or two and donate the others to my LFS. So far though they seem more inclined to stay on the acrylic and don't seem to like the lava and sandstone rocks. They were just so cheap and were buy one get one free where I bought them so I ended up with more than I would have bought otherwise.

[Mustafa]

Yeah, they do tend to prefer flat surfaces, but once the algae have been eliminated from those, they do seek other surfaces for their grazing. Usually, one is *more* than enough as they end up growing to about an inch (or larger) in diameter. I had this exact species before (self-caught) and they are, in my opinion, one of the most beautiful nerites out there.

[Iwantshrimp]

I am new to this forum and just started today so sorry I'm am shrimp stupid Anyway I got a 3 gallon tank with a light that has day/ moonlight settings and a filter the filter I won't use. Hopefully your shrimp do well! Does anyone know if I can put plants from a separate breeder into my pet shrimp.com shrimp tank? I'm worried about the different bacteria