Plants and small fish to go with cherry shrimps.

[johnny cash]

Hi,

My name is Danny I'm 19 years old and living in Holland. I have a small fishtank here (Aqua 40) which contains 27 liters, not sure how much that would be in gallons.
I'm planning to keep cherry shrimp and a small group of small fish. I would like to only use fish and plants that exist in the cherry shrimp's natural habitat. As if that's not enough, I'm looking for small plants to cover the entire substrate of my aquarium with small plants (all the same plants) and one or two larger plants. I would like to only use two species of plants. I'm not sure if you would refer to kinds of plants as species in English, sorry.
Don't worry about the lack of light in an Aqua 40 aquarium, I'm going to put an extra light in and use Co2 as well.
I doubt this a plausible thing for me to accomplish and if it's not, I'll just use plants and fish from similar water types but still I'd appreciate any of yor input.

Thanks.

[rich311k]

Interesting idea. That size tank is going to be very small fish you do not have much space. Where do cherry shrimp come from?

[johnny cash]

Several sources say they originate from Taiwan but I'm not 100% sure if they can only be found there.

[johnny cash]

So nobody has an answer to this? Same thing happened on 3 Dutch forums I posed this question on. I guess it's too hard a question. Maybe I should try a biology forum or something.

[gadget228]

Don't give up yet, sure somebody has the answer your looking for and Welcome to the AC :22:

[tori.lock]

I wont be much help, but have you looked into java moss, or another moss, to use as groundcover? I don't know how well it works, but I think I've heard of people reversing the moss wall concept and using it to make a blanket to cover the bottom of the tank. Not sure if java moss is native to Taiwan, but I do know that cherry shrimp love it.

I suggest researching fish/plants that are native to Taiwan and narrowing your search down from that and then asking questions here. If you can't find anything that will work from Taiwan, broaden your search to all of Asia.

[johnny cash]

To be honest I'm not too fond of java moss. I think it grows too wild and lacks structure and shape. Grass-like plants or carpet forming plants are my favorites. After doing some more research I'm thinking I might abandon the plan of using fish and plants native to the same waters. I think it's damn near impossible to find them.

PS: Sorry for my very late reaction.

[Lab_Rat]

I keep Endler's livebearers with my RCS and it's worked out so far.

[korith]

At the moment I have red cherry shrimp in a 20g and a 8g tank that has boraras maculatus, boraras merah, and boraras brigittae. All these fish top out at a little under an inch in length. Have had this setup for about a year now and seems to work, they even leave the baby shrimp alone, which are incredibly small. Otocinclus are shrimp safe as well. Not sure what other fish you will have luck with, most fish even if the shrimp won't fit in their mouth, will just tear away at the shrimp till they do.

For ground cover, maybe dwarf hairgrass, microsword, a moss of some sort, and hc (hemianthus callitrichoides).

[Taurus]

At the moment I have red cherry shrimp in a 20g and a 8g tank that has boraras maculatus, boraras merah, and boraras brigittae. For ground cover, maybe dwarf hairgrass, microsword, a moss of some sort, and hc (hemianthus callitrichoides).

Micro rasbora, as korith states, would work well.

[Garrett]

Neon tetras, maybe? Not sure how big the tank is in gallons, but the bioload on a small shoal of neons is pretty low.

Microrasboras would work well too.

[korith]

Neon tetras, maybe? Not sure how big the tank is in gallons, but the bioload on a small shoal of neons is pretty low.

Microrasboras would work well too.

Pretty sure neons would make a feast out of the shrimp. Might leave the adults alone, but the little ones would get picked off.

Though I suppose if you have enough ground cover, you can probably hold the shrimp population in check. Will lose some to the larger fish, and gain some new shrimp.

[Garrett]

That's more or less what I was thinking, especially if he was planning on planting the entire bottom of the tank in some sort of foliage.

[chuckbob34]

blue eyed rice fish or some nano fish like boras. heres a kink with some very small colorful fish that could go in a 7 gallon shrimp tank
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[Wild Turkey]

Im not sure as far as the bio-tope. But dont give up its a cool idea.

Dwarf sag is a grassy carpet plant that grows fast and doesnt demand too much

Any micro fish, neons, or cardinals are the most popular fish to keep with cherries if you dont want to stress them out.

[Tanichthys]

Wikipedia says the shrimp are from Thailand, though I'd guess they have a broader range. Not sure of the exact habitat though. If they like shallow fields then a small school of celestial pearl danios might be appropriate for your waterscape. They come from Myanmar--very close by.

Do the "cherry shrimp" occur in that color naturally? I googled them and they're Neocaridina heteropoda, but the wild colors don't look that red. Just in case you're going for all natural...

[korith]

Do the "cherry shrimp" occur in that color naturally? I googled them and they're Neocaridina heteropoda, but the wild colors don't look that red. Just in case you're going for all natural...

Naturally they occur in many different color ranges. 'red cherry' is just one of the colors people have selectively bred over many generations. Can't really breed them pure, you'll still have a few other colored ones show up each generation. One of my tanks, the rcs, i have a lot of brown ones with a stripe along the back, green ones as well occasionally.

[jcarr71]

You'd have a hell of a hard time finding them, but for fish a male dario dario and two females would fit perfectly in with the shrimp. Just search online for them. They stay tiny and the males are gorgeous. You HAVE to get females though, as a warning, or else leave the one male alone. 7 gallons is far too small for two male darios.

[Wild Turkey]

In nature they are usually brown. The colors are bred out like a lot of inverts

If you want to keep the colors bright you need to have a breeding stock separate from the broodstock usually.