I already have a well established tank with 6 shrimp in it. My friend has recently given me her ecosphere with two shrimp in it. It used to have four and she doesn't want the other two to die, and she liked my tank, so she asked me to care for them.
My plan was to give the shrimp a few days to acclimate to my room before starting anything. Then I was going to open the cork at the bottom, and add some of my tank water, maybe over the course of a few days. Then I was going to somehow transfer them to my tank. Most likely it will be a very careful dumping, or submerging the sphere and hoping they swim out.
Does this sound like a good plan?
Also,is it worth keeping the rest of what was in the sphere? I mean the coral and shells and wood thing (if i can even get it out), or is that more of a personal preference?
Thanks!
Mixing Ecosphere and Tank
Moderator: Mustafa
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below_radar_00
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Re: Mixing Ecosphere and Tank
Hi sabbylina!
I had two small pods and two large spheres from Ecosphere that I transferred into two different tanks. It's not too hard to do. Removing the plug is pretty simple...you just grab a knife and start digging up that hot glue or whatever the adhesive is until you can finally pry open the plug. You'll hear a rush of air once you break the seal. It is a little difficult to get the little guys out of the unit though. Some of them are a bit stubborn and try to hang on for dear life. If you decide to pour then just gently tip the unit over and start pouring the water out into a different container. You may get the shrimp to swim right out. If they hang on then you'll have to wait until the water level is low enough that they are pretty much forced out as you tip the unit. The part that worried me was the fear of crushing the little guys with the substrate that was flying around and the branch. But four units in and not a single shrimp died.
I'm not really sure if they'll swim out via submersion. If they do, it may take a while. It's probably easier just to go for the dumping method.
Depending on how big your main tank is, you may want to consider not mixing the Ecosphere water with your water. My Ecosphere water wasn't that bad so I combined most of it with the tank but if that unit is old it may have high levels of ammonia which could hurt your tank. When in doubt you could test the water with a kit. I use the test tube kits because I've read that they are most accurate than the strips. Not sure how true that is but seems to be the common consensus online. If you have a big tank then the little bit of Ecosphere water might not hurt anything. If you don't want to combine water then dump out as much of water as you can (without the shrimp) into another cup. Keep it to the side in case you need to put more water back in to get out a straggler. Then when you get low in the unit just dump the shrimp and leftover water into another cup and dump that into your tank. A little bit of Ecosphere water shouldn't hurt anything.
As far as substrate goes, I added the little white rock things into both the tanks. I also added the branch but then didn't like the look of it so I took it out. I guess you *could* contaminate the tank water if things in the Ecosphere were bad but a simple scrubbing with distilled water (not tap water) should fix that. My units were all only a few months old so I didn't worry about any of that. The branch is a bit difficult to get out depending on what unit you have. With the pods, I just grabbed the end of it with pliers and pulled it out. It folded right up on it's way out. With the large spheres, I had to break the glass to get the branch out. I just threw the sphere into my trashcan a couple of times until it busted open. Haha.
If you want to read up more you can search the forum with the keyword Ecosphere. You'll find several threads, including mine. My Ecosphere trip was a wild ride but I'm three months or so into freeing my Ecosphere shirmp and all is well. Very much worth it. My Ecosphere shrimp were dying left and right, in all four tanks. I'd say I lost 50-60% of the shrimp in just 3-4 months. But now everyone is happy and healthy.
I had two small pods and two large spheres from Ecosphere that I transferred into two different tanks. It's not too hard to do. Removing the plug is pretty simple...you just grab a knife and start digging up that hot glue or whatever the adhesive is until you can finally pry open the plug. You'll hear a rush of air once you break the seal. It is a little difficult to get the little guys out of the unit though. Some of them are a bit stubborn and try to hang on for dear life. If you decide to pour then just gently tip the unit over and start pouring the water out into a different container. You may get the shrimp to swim right out. If they hang on then you'll have to wait until the water level is low enough that they are pretty much forced out as you tip the unit. The part that worried me was the fear of crushing the little guys with the substrate that was flying around and the branch. But four units in and not a single shrimp died.
I'm not really sure if they'll swim out via submersion. If they do, it may take a while. It's probably easier just to go for the dumping method.
Depending on how big your main tank is, you may want to consider not mixing the Ecosphere water with your water. My Ecosphere water wasn't that bad so I combined most of it with the tank but if that unit is old it may have high levels of ammonia which could hurt your tank. When in doubt you could test the water with a kit. I use the test tube kits because I've read that they are most accurate than the strips. Not sure how true that is but seems to be the common consensus online. If you have a big tank then the little bit of Ecosphere water might not hurt anything. If you don't want to combine water then dump out as much of water as you can (without the shrimp) into another cup. Keep it to the side in case you need to put more water back in to get out a straggler. Then when you get low in the unit just dump the shrimp and leftover water into another cup and dump that into your tank. A little bit of Ecosphere water shouldn't hurt anything.
As far as substrate goes, I added the little white rock things into both the tanks. I also added the branch but then didn't like the look of it so I took it out. I guess you *could* contaminate the tank water if things in the Ecosphere were bad but a simple scrubbing with distilled water (not tap water) should fix that. My units were all only a few months old so I didn't worry about any of that. The branch is a bit difficult to get out depending on what unit you have. With the pods, I just grabbed the end of it with pliers and pulled it out. It folded right up on it's way out. With the large spheres, I had to break the glass to get the branch out. I just threw the sphere into my trashcan a couple of times until it busted open. Haha.
If you want to read up more you can search the forum with the keyword Ecosphere. You'll find several threads, including mine. My Ecosphere trip was a wild ride but I'm three months or so into freeing my Ecosphere shirmp and all is well. Very much worth it. My Ecosphere shrimp were dying left and right, in all four tanks. I'd say I lost 50-60% of the shrimp in just 3-4 months. But now everyone is happy and healthy.
Re: Mixing Ecosphere and Tank
Thanks so much! All of the shrimp in my tank do well with the swimming out method. Maybe they've just gotten used to it as I've had to travel them to transfer containers at the end of the school year/summer a few times.
The tank is a full gallon with about a third of it full of the chaetomorpha bought from Mustafa, and is 1.5 years old. That should be big enough/ well balanced enough to absorb anything in a small ecosphere right?
Would you recommend putting my tank water in the ecosphere before transferring them so they have a chance to acclimate?
Thanks again
The tank is a full gallon with about a third of it full of the chaetomorpha bought from Mustafa, and is 1.5 years old. That should be big enough/ well balanced enough to absorb anything in a small ecosphere right?
Would you recommend putting my tank water in the ecosphere before transferring them so they have a chance to acclimate?
Thanks again
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below_radar_00
- Larva
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Re: Mixing Ecosphere and Tank
No problem!
I'm not sure if 1 gallon is big enough to prevent issues with potentially bad Ecosphere water. The small Ecosphere is tiny so my guess would be that you're okay but I'm certainly no professional in this matter. I only know from a little bit of experience. I'd try and figure out the age of that sphere. If it's less than a year old then you might be fine. If it's one of those ones that been around for years then I wouldn't risk it. I'd dump as much water out of it as possible before the transfer.
I didn't do any sort of acclimating with mine. Honestly, these guys seem like they can withstand just about anything. I could write a small book about the weird experiences I've had. I originally purchased two small pods. One for my office and one for my parents. I ended up loving both the pods so I kept both with the intention of buying my parents a larger one for Christmas. Christmas came closer and I bought the large unit and you guessed it...fell in love with that one also. So I kept it too and purchased another large one for my parents. I had my large in the living room and the two small pods in my office. I gave my parents the other large sphere for Christmas and then in Jan I noticed half my shrimp were dead and things were looking horrible. I did some research online and that's when I found this site as well as Fukubonsai.com. I decided to order the half gallon setup from Fukubonsai so I'd have some water that's already established. I didn't want to wait 30 days for the water to cycle since my shrimp were dying left and right already. I combined the Fukubonsai setup with my remaining three Ecosphere units into a one gallon beta bowl. Then I did the same for my parents since their shrimp were also dying fast.
Then I decided to setup another tank in my office since my 1 gallon tank was in my living room and I was missing those little guys at the office. I found a guy selling shrimp for a really low price and he also had algae covered rock and pre-cycled water. I thought "Oh, great way to get another gallon tank setup right away". Boy was I wrong. The seller shipped a pound of rocks, a gallon of water, and 30 shrimp in on box instead of in separate boxes like his website said. He sent the package out during the big ice storm so it was delayed for days. When it finally arrived the box was soaked. The post office was ticked off at me because the package had been leaking all over the post office and their trucks. They ended up wrapping the box in plastic and putting it in one of those corrugated carrying boxes they have. They asked if I wanted to refuse the shipment but I didn't know how much water had leaked out so I decided to take the package in case the shrimp had managed to survive. It was pretty nasty inside that box...The gallon of water turned into about half a cup of water...I'm not exaggerating. There were dead shrimp everywhere. Some were crushed from the pound of rocks that was in a bag next to them and others were just dead from lack of water. I managed to save a few. At first I thought only 4 survived but I poured all of them into a cup with fresh brackish water that I just mixed a few days before. The next day, I think around 20 of them were alive somehow. I really have no idea how they survived since some of them were completely without water for who knows how long. Since the water was all gone I had to start this tank with a gallon of freshly mixed brackish water...no cycling whatsoever. Now I did buy chateo and snails from Mustafa just like I did for my other gallon setup and my parents gallon setup. But everything was thrown into the tank on the same day. I figured the shrimp would die a few days later from shock so I went ahead and purchased 30 more shrimp from another dealer. They arrived perfectly. By the time I got these shrimp the tank had been up for several weeks, no deaths. I ended up splitting these shrimp between both my tanks.
All that to say...my experience is that these guys are indeed SUPER shrimp. I'm sure it's not recommended to setup a fresh tank like I did but I had no choice and it was the only way I could even attempt to salvage what this other dealer did. And it worked out fine. Several months later and all tanks are doing great. Shrimp are eating, most are red, etc. So you should be fine just dumping them in. I did it with four Ecospheres, two Fukubonsai setups, and shrimp from two other dealers. Plus three orders of chaeto and snails from Mustafa and all is fine.
I'm not sure if 1 gallon is big enough to prevent issues with potentially bad Ecosphere water. The small Ecosphere is tiny so my guess would be that you're okay but I'm certainly no professional in this matter. I only know from a little bit of experience. I'd try and figure out the age of that sphere. If it's less than a year old then you might be fine. If it's one of those ones that been around for years then I wouldn't risk it. I'd dump as much water out of it as possible before the transfer.
I didn't do any sort of acclimating with mine. Honestly, these guys seem like they can withstand just about anything. I could write a small book about the weird experiences I've had. I originally purchased two small pods. One for my office and one for my parents. I ended up loving both the pods so I kept both with the intention of buying my parents a larger one for Christmas. Christmas came closer and I bought the large unit and you guessed it...fell in love with that one also. So I kept it too and purchased another large one for my parents. I had my large in the living room and the two small pods in my office. I gave my parents the other large sphere for Christmas and then in Jan I noticed half my shrimp were dead and things were looking horrible. I did some research online and that's when I found this site as well as Fukubonsai.com. I decided to order the half gallon setup from Fukubonsai so I'd have some water that's already established. I didn't want to wait 30 days for the water to cycle since my shrimp were dying left and right already. I combined the Fukubonsai setup with my remaining three Ecosphere units into a one gallon beta bowl. Then I did the same for my parents since their shrimp were also dying fast.
Then I decided to setup another tank in my office since my 1 gallon tank was in my living room and I was missing those little guys at the office. I found a guy selling shrimp for a really low price and he also had algae covered rock and pre-cycled water. I thought "Oh, great way to get another gallon tank setup right away". Boy was I wrong. The seller shipped a pound of rocks, a gallon of water, and 30 shrimp in on box instead of in separate boxes like his website said. He sent the package out during the big ice storm so it was delayed for days. When it finally arrived the box was soaked. The post office was ticked off at me because the package had been leaking all over the post office and their trucks. They ended up wrapping the box in plastic and putting it in one of those corrugated carrying boxes they have. They asked if I wanted to refuse the shipment but I didn't know how much water had leaked out so I decided to take the package in case the shrimp had managed to survive. It was pretty nasty inside that box...The gallon of water turned into about half a cup of water...I'm not exaggerating. There were dead shrimp everywhere. Some were crushed from the pound of rocks that was in a bag next to them and others were just dead from lack of water. I managed to save a few. At first I thought only 4 survived but I poured all of them into a cup with fresh brackish water that I just mixed a few days before. The next day, I think around 20 of them were alive somehow. I really have no idea how they survived since some of them were completely without water for who knows how long. Since the water was all gone I had to start this tank with a gallon of freshly mixed brackish water...no cycling whatsoever. Now I did buy chateo and snails from Mustafa just like I did for my other gallon setup and my parents gallon setup. But everything was thrown into the tank on the same day. I figured the shrimp would die a few days later from shock so I went ahead and purchased 30 more shrimp from another dealer. They arrived perfectly. By the time I got these shrimp the tank had been up for several weeks, no deaths. I ended up splitting these shrimp between both my tanks.
All that to say...my experience is that these guys are indeed SUPER shrimp. I'm sure it's not recommended to setup a fresh tank like I did but I had no choice and it was the only way I could even attempt to salvage what this other dealer did. And it worked out fine. Several months later and all tanks are doing great. Shrimp are eating, most are red, etc. So you should be fine just dumping them in. I did it with four Ecospheres, two Fukubonsai setups, and shrimp from two other dealers. Plus three orders of chaeto and snails from Mustafa and all is fine.
Re: Mixing Ecosphere and Tank
Well I just finished moving them. It went pretty well. I had a little trouble with the glue, and had to get inventive with the dumping, but once I got the shrimp into a Tupperware, it was smooth sailing. I've seen for sure one of them milling about my tank. She seemed to just be sitting at the bottom not sure what to do, but did move. The other one ran for cover under my coral the second she was in. All the rest of the shrimp are white, but swimming around. One even seams to have molted in the last day.
My only remaining question is, is the magnet from the ecosphere safe to keep in my tank? I didn't realize how much algae was on the corner near my desk light until i rubbed a little bit of it off with the magnet. I want to keep it around to clean my walls a bit, but is it safe?
Thanks for all the help!
My only remaining question is, is the magnet from the ecosphere safe to keep in my tank? I didn't realize how much algae was on the corner near my desk light until i rubbed a little bit of it off with the magnet. I want to keep it around to clean my walls a bit, but is it safe?
Thanks for all the help!
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below_radar_00
- Larva
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- Joined: Thu Jan 09, 2014 7:04 am
Re: Mixing Ecosphere and Tank
I think so. I accidentally put the magnet in one or both of mine and no problems.
Glad it worked out for you!
Glad it worked out for you!
Re: Mixing Ecosphere and Tank
UPDATE!
They're both doing GREAT! I didn't realize how tiny they were until I put them in and they were around half the size of my own shrimp. All of these shrimp are about the same age too. I Can't help thinking i got them in there in the nick of time.
Since they're been in, the two new ones have been red basically the entire time, which is refreshing to see. My other six have also been red so much more often. I'm starting to wonder if they were just lonely in the big tank and wanted more friends. It could also be that we've been having a heatwave and they are enjoying the warmth xD
Probably the best news though is that they new ladies are growing, and fast! They are only about 2/3 the size of the others instead of half, and all in a little over a month!
I'm sorry I can't post a picture but every time I try the forum says the file is too big.
Any Advice for that?
Thanks again for all the help you gave me! It really eased my nerves about the guys. Maybe soon I can finally get some shrimp babies. I literally dream about it several times.. It's really sad, but i'm so so excited to see them.
They're both doing GREAT! I didn't realize how tiny they were until I put them in and they were around half the size of my own shrimp. All of these shrimp are about the same age too. I Can't help thinking i got them in there in the nick of time.
Since they're been in, the two new ones have been red basically the entire time, which is refreshing to see. My other six have also been red so much more often. I'm starting to wonder if they were just lonely in the big tank and wanted more friends. It could also be that we've been having a heatwave and they are enjoying the warmth xD
Probably the best news though is that they new ladies are growing, and fast! They are only about 2/3 the size of the others instead of half, and all in a little over a month!
I'm sorry I can't post a picture but every time I try the forum says the file is too big.
Any Advice for that?Thanks again for all the help you gave me! It really eased my nerves about the guys. Maybe soon I can finally get some shrimp babies. I literally dream about it several times.. It's really sad, but i'm so so excited to see them.
Re: Mixing Ecosphere and Tank
You have to decrease the size of the file with some kind of image software. If you have Google's picasa, it will do it for you. Just get the size to about 1000 pixels (width or length..doesn't matter) before uploading. Giant pictures take up space and distort the forum. That's why there is a size limit.