I just started getting into this hobby of aquatic plants in the aquarium and all. Very interesting and lots and lots to learn. I have "fallen in love" so to speak with the Yamato shrimps, which is the only species I see available in my country so far and have bought a few to put into my planted tank last weekend. However, after 2 or 3 days, all of them died. The people in my local aquarium shop just tells me "must be the water!" and nothing else so they are no help at all.
Could you please advise me as to what to look out for in order to check to see what is wrong? My water PH is slightly below neutral. I do not have any test kit yet for water hardness (KH?). Do I need to test for this? What else to test for?
Would appreciate any advise as I would love to rear these shrimps in my aquarium. Not even thinking of breeding them at this point. They are such a joy to watch.
I am strongly suspecting that you have copper in your water. Lots of plant fertilizers contain copper and even the smallest amounts of copper can kill shrimp. I don't think you have to worry about KH/GH or PH parameters. In that regard, these shrimp are very adjustable as long as extremes are avoided.
Are you using plant fertilizer in your tanks? If so, then it's the copper.
Petshrimp.com wrote:I am strongly suspecting that you have copper in your water. Lots of plant fertilizers contain copper and even the smallest amounts of copper can kill shrimp. I don't think you have to worry about KH/GH or PH parameters. In that regard, these shrimp are very adjustable as long as extremes are avoided.
Are you using plant fertilizer in your tanks? If so, then it's the copper.
Take care,
Mustafa
Hello. Thanks for your reply. No...I have not added any fertilizers to my water except for the base for establishing the substrate when I first started my tank. Is there any way to test for copper in the water?
Yes, there are test kits for measuring copper in your water, just like you have test kits for GH/KH, PH, Ammonia etc. They are just not very commonly used and your local fish store might not have them in store. They can order it for you, though, or you can just bring a sample of your aquarium water AND your tap water to do a test for you.
You have to test your tap water, too, since the copper might be coming from the tap already. The copper might also have been introduced through the plants. Lots of times commercial plant growers use large amounts of copper in their plant tanks. When you buy the plants there is copper "stuck" to the plant and dissolves slowly in your aquarium water.
Or...it might really be in the substrate. How knows...
The best way, without test kits, to find out what the culprit is, is to establish a new tank without any plants or special plant substrate (just normal gravel will do) and have it cycle until the ammonia and nitrites are all gone. I am assuming here that you know about the new tank cycling process. Then you can buy some more shrimp and stick them in the new tank. If they are doing fine, then obviously there is nothing wrong with your water out of the tap. Then I would go and buy some plants for the tank. If the shrimp show signs of stress after you put in the plants, then you know that the culprit is the plants. If the shrimp still do fine after you put in the plants, then you can be sure that your plant substrate is to blame for the shrimp deaths.
I do not advocate using shrimp as "live test kits", though. You should always have another cycled tank (could be a small one) ready to put the shrimp in, when they are showing signs of stress after you start adding plants etc. to the "test tank". The little "safety tank" should be cycled with bottled spring water or something similar.
Well...the best way (and easiest way) to go is still to purchase the copper test sets and see how that works out for you.
By the way, did you have any other animals in the tank before you added the shrimp? If not, than your tank did not go through bacterial cycle process and ammonia might the what's killing your shrimp.
Either way, you need to test the water parameters before putting in any more shrimp in your planted tank.
Thank you, Mustafa for your detailed explanation. It is much appreciated. Yes, I'm thinking of starting up a smaller tank as per your suggestion and see what happens. One more query, I measured the temp in my current tank and it shows 30degrees Celcius. Is this too high and what is the optimum temp? Thanks again!
30 degrees celsius is way too high! Those shrimp are *not* tropical species. They occur in parts of Japan where it can get really cold in the winter. That might actually be the reason why your shrimp are dying. Keep them at 20-25 degrees celsius and they will be fine.
Also be very careful there is no detectable ammonia in your tank at all, shrimp do not tolerate it at all and should not be added to a tank that is not cycled or finished cycling.
Petshrimp.com wrote:30 degrees celsius is way too high! Those shrimp are *not* tropical species. They occur in parts of Japan where it can get really cold in the winter. That might actually be the reason why your shrimp are dying. Keep them at 20-25 degrees celsius and they will be fine.
Mustafa
20-25 degree Celcius...Perfect for shrimps but could this temperature be too cold for the fishes which I have in my tank? I have cardinal tetras, neon tetras, black tetras and 2 clown loaches. I ask because yesterday I put a fan blowing into my aquarium water and managed to bring down my 31 degree celcius water down to 25 degree in the night.
Sounds perfect...HOWEVER...This morning, I woke up and found all my fish lost their colour, the neon & cardinal tetra are pale and they're swimming funny. But all the fish are still alive. I checked some websites and the fishes I mentioned are supposed to be able to tolerate temperates down to 22 degrees but somehow I doubt it. sigh. Solve one problem and another one comes up.
I doubt that the loss of color in your fish has anything to do with the temperature. It could just be that the temperature drop happened too quickly. Especially neon tetras do not like sudden changes. 25 degrees celsius is totally sufficient for tetras. Just a wait a couple days and you'll probably see their colors come back.
Petshrimp.com wrote:I doubt that the loss of color in your fish has anything to do with the temperature. It could just be that the temperature drop happened too quickly. Especially neon tetras do not like sudden changes. 25 degrees celsius is totally sufficient for tetras. Just a wait a couple days and you'll probably see their colors come back.
Take care,
Mustafa
Hi...I think I panicked prematurely when I look at my fishes this morning and saw that the colour had faded and that they were acting lethargically. Later I was told that fishes do lose their colours at night when they go to sleep. Probably my fishes were still half-asleep when I looked at them this morning. They seem to be fine now and the colour has come back already.
Well...unfortunately, bringing the temp down did not solve my problem of the Yamato shrimps dying. It always happens just after 24 hours of being in the tank. When the shrimp is alright, it is transparent looking. When it has problem and about to die, I notice it turns whitish inside it's shell. Then it'll start crashing around the tank and finally just die. sigh
I changed most of the water in my tank yesterday on the advise of the people at the LFS. Will see if this works.
As I said before, the problem is that something is leaking into your water from the tank itself. Changing the water won't solve the problem since whater is leaking into the water will do the same thing in the new water.
Petshrimp.com wrote:As I said before, the problem is that something is leaking into your water from the tank itself. Changing the water won't solve the problem since whater is leaking into the water will do the same thing in the new water.
Mustafa
Hello Mustafa. Well...sad to say, nothing I've tried so far has solved the problem of my prawns dying. So I finally went ahead and did it.
Stripped down my tank, replaced the substrate with new. I've planted the tank and leaving it to cycle for a week or two. One question...
I thought to introduce the Siamese Algae Eater into my tank after two weeks for them to start producing the ammonia, so the good bacteria can start to breed and also to feed on any algae that has grown during this two week period. Do you think I can also put in the Amano shrimps or should I wait?
Definitely do *not* put in the shrimp. They can't take any ammonia at all and will die very quickly. I would not put any fish in the tank to cycle it if possible. Try the "fishless cycle" method (do a search on google). You need to go get yourself some pure ammonia (any concentration is fine) and use it to cycle your tanks. Here in the US I got a liter bottle of 3% ammonia (sold as "household ammonia" for cleaning) for about $1. It's very cheap and works better and faster than fish. Make sure you do not get any ammonia that has additives and other chemicals in it.
