My new Opae Ula tank

[Harry]

If you don't want to disturb your gravel when adding water, try this. Get two plastic drinking cups. Place one cup within the tank with the bottom of the cup top against the tank wall. The cup will be at 45 degrees, pointing up in the same manner as you would hold it to your mouth. Again, the bottom of the cup top will be touching the aquarium wall. With the second cup, gently pour the water into the first cup. As the cup fills, the water will run down the wall of the aquarium with minimal disturbance to your aquascape. And "gently" is the key.

[AndyH]

danzel - They're the brackish water snails that you can buy from the website that we are currently browsing, petshrimp.com. If you look at the top bar of the website and click on PETSHRIMP STORE, you can find them in there. I think they're MTS.

Harry - I've already put the water in my tank, but that's a good method of how to do it without messing up the gravel. I think the main thing is being careful and pouring gently like you said.

While I was away, no algae really grew since there was not much light on the tank.
All of the snails have moved to new locations, so that's good to see that they're all alive. They like the macroalgae and the white rock I have in there. A couple of them are buried in the substrate.
I'm going to wait another two weeks for the tank to cycle though just to be safe. While it cycles, I've got the heater and air stone on, but both will be gone or off when the shrimp go in.
I took one more picture... The glare and reflections on the sides of the tank make it almost impossible to take a good one. No more pictures after this one though until I get the shrimp in there.

[KenCotigirl]

I like it. The black lava looks great!

[AndyH]

Thank you very much!

[Harry]

Mustafa's snails are not MTS (Malaysian Trumpet Snails). They look like MTS but are darker in color, with a bit of green. They are Tarebia Granifera,aka Quilted Melania (according to Mustafa). They are freshwater snails and I believe Mustafa has adapted them to brackish water.

[AndyH]

Alrighty, thanks for the clarification Harry.
I don't know hardly anything about snails and I just said MTS because the item description in the store says, "These particular snails are brackish water populations of Tarebia granifera or Melanoides tuberculata (you will get either one or the other species, or a mix)." When I did a Google search of 'Melanoides tuberculata', it said MTS; So that's how I came to that conclusion.
But it also has 'Tarebia granifera' in the description too, so they could easily be Quilted Melania like you say too. You're right about them having a bit of green in their shells. I've also got one that looks more red-ish.

[Harry]

I'm pretty sure the green on their shells is algae. The textbooks don't show the green.

[Mustafa]

Mustafa's snails are not MTS (Malaysian Trumpet Snails). They look like MTS but are darker in color, with a bit of green. They are Tarebia Granifera,aka Quilted Melania (according to Mustafa). They are freshwater snails and I believe Mustafa has adapted them to brackish water.

You're right...people who received snails from me so far, should have all gotten T. granifera (unless a small M. tuberculata snuck in). I may send both, but so far it's always been T. granifera as far as I know. Anyway, both species cannot really be considered "freshwater" per se. A more correct term would be "euryhaline" species. Such species can usually live (and breed) in a wide range of salinities, ranging from completely freshwater to completely marine water...and sometimes even beyond. For example, I know from experience that M. tuberculata can withstand *twice* ocean salinity...and so can the Supershrimp Maroalga species I am selling. Found out accidentally when I left a small shoe-box sized tub with "temporarily" stored macroalgae and snails out there for a few weeks...the orginal salinity was about 30 ppt...by the time the water had evaporated away for the most part the Macroalgae and snails were in 70 ppt salinity water! T. granifera are probably similarly tolerant....I would have to experiment with them to find out for sure.

[AndyH]

Thanks for the info Mustafa.

I've got a nice amount of green algae appearing under the white sand now. Can't wait for it to keep spreading. Some slime/very very light algae is growing on the sides of the tank. I'm hoping that some good bacteria is growing all over the rocks and substrate by now but of course I can't see it. The supershrimp macroalgae is growing already.
The snails look like they're really comfortable, and I've already spotted at least three different baby snails. I like watching the snails move around the tank; they actually race around a lot faster than I thought they would. I saw one digging into the sand right next to the side of the tank earlier and it reminded me of an ant farm or something.

[brianc]

Have you decided to run a sponge filter or not?

For those who have no filters, how do you deal with that film that produces on the top of the water?

[KenCotigirl]

Brine shrimp net

[Rob in Puyallup]

There's film on top of my opae ula tank. Single celled algae, I believe. The shrimp love it! They swim upside-down filter feeding off of it.

[AndyH]

Got some Opae Ula in the mail today!! They're from a member on another forum. He was breeding a few of them in Texas and was willing to sell me some. None of them were DOA. They acclimated very well and they seem to be acting normal, according to what I've read on this forum. Anyways, I'm excited. Here's another picture.



And then I noticed two different females carrying eggs. One has 3 eggs, and one has 4 eggs. I'm assuming they'll drop them or whatever but it is still exciting to see a berried female on the first day I have them.



There was also one larvae in the bag. He's been swimming vertically and looks pretty good! I'm hoping he survives. Too small for my phone to get a good picture of but he's a blurry one at least.



Only 3 snails were on top of the substrate when I put in the shrimp but they quickly disappeared. I thought that was interesting. Hopefully they pop up to say hey to their new tankmates soon.

EDIT/Update on tank: The heater is out of the tank now. I don't think it even helped when cycling. Probably a waste. I also took out the airstone and airline that I was using when cycling the tank. Unfortunately the suction cups left a mark on the wall of the tank but it's not that big of a deal. Maybe one day some regular algae or the macroalgae will cover the blemish.

[Rob in Puyallup]

Hey Andy!

Congrats on the new shrimpies!!!

[KenCotigirl]

Andy the black lava and shrimp look good together. I bet the shrimp will redden up in a couple days. Send more pics. Do not think negatively about the berried shrimp. If they made it through the mail they will probably hold them. I am surprised how tough the larvae are. I believe Rob also received a larvae in the mail. I would have thought the mailing would be too stressful for the larvae.