Newbie with Two Tanks

[media_specialist]

Hello!
I am new to the aquarium and shrimp world.
I stumbled across the Petshrimp site and I was hooked and I am so excited to order my shrimp!
I am setting up two 2.5 gallon NanoCubes, one at my house and one in my media center at my school.
I ordered everything from this site, except for the glass tank and the brand new aquarium decorations, and I followed the directions posted on setting up the tank. The tanks are set up one day apart, although I bought an LED light on Amazon for the one at home since it does not get natural light. The one at school has skylights above it.
The snails went in after week one and they have been doing great!
We are at 3 weeks and 5/6 days and I am not sure I see any algae in either tank, but I am seeing something in each tank...but they are different.
I do have some biofilm at the top of both tanks and the macroalgae have grown.

As I am home, I have pictures of the home tank. I will post pictures of the school tank tomorrow.

In the home tank, I am seeing some brown growth on the black lava rocks. (see pictures below)

1) Is this algae?

2) Is it normal for the water to have evaporated this fast in 3 and a half weeks?

3) the mossball has some white to it now... is this ok? (picture with the blue arrow)

4) I bought this LED light from amazon for plants: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08QR ... =UTF8&th=1
Is this too strong for my tank (fast evaporation)? Or should I have bought the freshwater light?

5) I saw in another post that Mustafa said you can't have too much of the white calcium rock, but when I have seen other tank setups, they do not have as much as I do... does anyone foresee future problems with having this much?

Thank you for any help and advice you can give me!
I will post the school tank pictures tomorrow.
The staff, students and I are very excited to meet our shrimp - I just want to make sure the tank is ready for them- so they can be happy and healthy!

[Rosiepink89]

Hi! Welcome, l'm pretty new myself but I'll give you answers based on what I know
1. Though I can't actually make it out in the photos it is most likely algae I started noticing a thin layer on my glass a few weeks in it never really got thick but everything has been going fantastic with my shrimp
2. Based off my tank and how fast that evaporated I'd say that's a normal amount.
3. I'm not sure is it maybe some biofilm? Have you given it a little shake too see if it falls off?
4. I'm no expert but I think that's fine
5. Honestly looks like how much is in mine I have mixed it into the top of the subrate so it's not all on the surface since I didn't like the look I don't think you should have issues.
It seems like Mustafa kind of does round every once and a while and answers any questions and such so I'm sure soon he'll correct me if I'm wrong lol

[sliphorn]

Hello!
I am new to the aquarium and shrimp world.
I stumbled across the Petshrimp site and I was hooked and I am so excited to order my shrimp!
I am setting up two 2.5 gallon NanoCubes, one at my house and one in my media center at my school.
I ordered everything from this site, except for the glass tank and the brand new aquarium decorations, and I followed the directions posted on setting up the tank. The tanks are set up one day apart, although I bought an LED light on Amazon for the one at home since it does not get natural light. The one at school has skylights above it.
The snails went in after week one and they have been doing great!
We are at 3 weeks and 5/6 days and I am not sure I see any algae in either tank, but I am seeing something in each tank...but they are different.
I do have some biofilm at the top of both tanks and the macroalgae have grown.

As I am home, I have pictures of the home tank. I will post pictures of the school tank tomorrow.

In the home tank, I am seeing some brown growth on the black lava rocks. (see pictures below)

1) Is this algae?

2) Is it normal for the water to have evaporated this fast in 3 and a half weeks?

3) the mossball has some white to it now... is this ok? (picture with the blue arrow)

4) I bought this LED light from amazon for plants: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08QR ... =UTF8&th=1
Is this too strong for my tank (fast evaporation)? Or should I have bought the freshwater light?

5) I saw in another post that Mustafa said you can't have too much of the white calcium rock, but when I have seen other tank setups, they do not have as much as I do... does anyone foresee future problems with having this much?

Thank you for any help and advice you can give me!
I will post the school tank pictures tomorrow.
The staff, students and I are very excited to meet our shrimp - I just want to make sure the tank is ready for them- so they can be happy and healthy!

..
Everything looks good. You are ready to go. The amount of calcium rock is fine. Order some shrimp and enjoy. Please remember that the less you do the better. The white in the mossball appears to be bubbles, indicating photo synthesis, though I can't be sure. No worries, though. Topping off with distilled or reverse osmosis water is all you will need to do for quite some time.
..

[media_specialist]

Wonderful! Thank you both so much for your reply!

Here is the school tank - similar setup but the screen on the top is to keep students from making a bad decision!
This tank has some little dark things that are on the white rock. Could it be snail poop? Algae? or just substrate?
On the white rocks in the front, there is some red/brown... I saw that Mustafa said that it can naturally occur in the rocks, but I swear that those rocks did not have that red when I put them in 4 weeks ago! Hopefully it is algae!
I can't imagine that the snails are moving the sand up on top of the rock...

I will order my shrimp! I am so excited!
Thanks again!

[media_specialist]

I just ordered my 20 shrimp - 10 for my home tank and 10 for the school tank!
Do you think that I will be able to open the shrimp, take out 10 and then close the bag up to take the other 10 in to school?
I am worried that I will have to cut the bag...and I need to keep the others safe and transport them to another location the next day.
Perhaps I will email to see if they can package in two separate bags.

[SuperProofer]

My bags were always tied very tightly and I had to cut them. You could always transfer them to a container with a lid just for the transporting. Or, before you open the bag, place it in the container, snip off the bare minimum to get it open, wrap the open edges around the edges of the container, scoop out the shrimp you want, then put the lid on the container, capturing the bag edges under the lid. Make sense? Then there's no worries about any chemicals that might be on the container hurting the shrimp.

[Mustafa]

How are your shrimp/tanks doing so far?

[media_specialist]

So all was going really well... it has been two months.
The tank at school (where I can watch them for longer - has lots of activity - the students love them!) I even got to see a shrimp clean the back of a snail and then he must have knocked his suction off - and the shrimp held on to the snail as it sank to the bottom.
The tank at school has no artificial light, as we have skylights in the roof. The algae has loved it and has gotten twice as big and is very green.

The tank at home was doing well. I have seen lots of molts of the shrimp. We have an artificial light on this one as we have it in our kitchen and there is no natural light in there.
The algae has grown but it is more a yellow green.
Today I noticed there are NO snails... I can count 9 shells on the gravel, not moving all day...and they look empty.
The shrimp are still all swimming around and seem fine.
Earlier in the week (Monday) I saw that the water had gotten low and I filled it back up with distilled water.
I have been feeding the tank once ever two weeks with Spriulina Powder - although I may have put more in than I should have... I put some out on a toothpick, but it spreads out when it hits the water. I remember scooping some out of this tank but maybe it just had too much.
I noticed there was a white feather looking thing in the water near the substrate. (You can see it in the picture that does not have the red plant in the bottom left corner.)

I put more distilled water in my tank at school on Friday...I hope I don't come back to school on Monday to the same thing...

I don't know what it going on.
I posted pictures below.
Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

What should I do?
Should I order more snails?

[Rosiepink89]

Hmm maybe hair algae?
As for the snails it's hard to tell if they're alive. I take them out to check them. They'll either pop out of the shell quickly annoyed a little or if nothing happens I give a little blow toward the hole and they'll move but sometimes it's just an empty shell and once I had dead snail bits come out so that was gross.

[Vorteil]

Best way to tell is see if the Operculum is still intact. If it is they're still alive as it will quickly detach when the MTS dies.

[media_specialist]

Thank you both for your advice - I see empty shells - and can't imagine that all of the snail is tucked away inside of that shell.

I thought that the snails were "hardier" than the shrimp...so I am at a loss for what could have killed them. I am just worried about the shrimp now - but they seem to be swimming around and not in distress or anything.

I want to make sure that it is good for me to add in new snails - I don't want the same thing to happen to them...

On a happier note - the tank at school is thriving! I have a berried female already!! So excited! That was way faster than I thought as it has only been two months since I set the tank up! Not the best pic but I attached it!

[media_specialist]

Better pictures of the lucky lady in the school tank!
She loves hiding in the big green plastic plant - that is definitely her safe spot in the tank.

Again - any help regarding the snails and what or if I should test the water to make sure everything is good - would be greatly appreciated.
We are going to be house moving in August - I can't wait to put the tank in some natural indirect light - I think that is why my school tank is so happy!

[dglidden]

I recently posted a thread about "Can my tank be TOO clean?" and the replies came back as "if the shrimp are good, your tank is good." Your comment "I have seen lots of molts of the shrimp." is a good sign. Perhaps feed them even less than you are, you could be contaminating the tank. They really don't need every-other-week feeding. More like every-other-month at most. Once you have some algae and bacteria established, you don't need to feed them much at all. I think you can safely add more snails.

[media_specialist]

Thank you for your help!
My husband moved the tank into a room that gets indirect sunlight - so I think the shrimp (and the algae) will be happier there! We took the plug in grow light off of the tank. I saw on a post that the light green algae can happen from lots of light but little nutrients.
I wonder now if I did not have enough algae for the snails...is it more likely they died from too little food - or overeating?

The shrimp are still doing well. I count 9 out of the 10...but I am hopeful one is just hiding somewhere...

We are moving in August...I wonder if I should let the tank adjust to its new natural light, move the tank and then get the snails. Really my question is - will the shrimp be ok for two to three months without snails?

I can of course order more snails - just worried that if I put them back in too quickly the same thing will happen to them! I did not do any water change or anything.

Thanks for all of the help!

[SuperProofer]

Shrimp are fine without snails. I've had tanks for a couple of years now and only recently added snails just to serve as a clean-up crew because there was more algae than the snails could keep up with and it was hard to see through the glass. The snails made short work of it and in about 2 weeks, the glass was crystal clear again.