Fed Up of the Battle - Shrimp Death Mystery

**talldutchie** · 03-14-2013, 09:02 AM

Do they curl up? Are the others eating the dead or avoiding them? Is there any metal of any kind in there?

**~firefly~** · 03-14-2013, 09:07 AM

I find them flat out, not curled up. Normally another shrimp has eaten the legs and will eat all of it if I don't get to it first. No metals in tank. Very odd.

No ammo or nitrite. Nitrate is 5.

**talldutchie** · 03-14-2013, 01:14 PM

That makes metal poisoning quite unlikely. I'm sure you checked but just in case. Chloramine?

**~firefly~** · 03-14-2013, 01:29 PM

Chloramines in the water - no idea. How would I check for this?
I use Aquasafe with every water change.
(thanks for all the input)

**talldutchie** · 03-14-2013, 04:15 PM

You don't test for that but aquasafe, at least the version in Europe, tackles both...
OK, another obvious one, there's been a few reports of bacterial infections in your country.

http://www.shrimpnow.com/content.php...rial-Infection

http://www.authorstream.com/Presenta...pt-powerpoint/

Might wanna look into that (if you have not already)

**~firefly~** · 03-14-2013, 09:36 PM

Oh dear...

That doesn't sound good.

**~firefly~** · 03-18-2013, 08:19 PM

Ok, I've scaled up the battle.

I removed the bogwood as I've decided to rescape this tank at a later date once I have control over my shrimp losses. The amount of muck underneath the tree stump was awful...it seems the shrimp had a little cave system underneath it. There were at least two bodies under there. Gross! I siphoned it all out, being careful not to suck up any babies and replanted the tank with cuttings from my other tank.

I pulled up a lot of the grass, rebunched it and cut it back, then replanted in a denser margin along the front. Lots of the grass has an established black beard algae problem now which is driving me mad. I'm already trimming it out and spot treating with EasyCarbo but it is very difficult to get rid of once you have it. I get bouts of it going brown/red and dying, then it comes back with a vengeance in that one spot - on the grass. Hmmm...

Anyway, here's the mess that is my shrimp tank now. Not really any hardscape now, I retied the anubia to a small piece of rock this time - and I know I'm starving the shrimp of their beloved grazing moss, but I want to keep the tank as clean as possible. I think for the future hardscape I will get some thin branches with moss growing on it to sit "claw-like" over the planting, maybe diagonaly. Not sure yet - I need to look at what is available in my LFS. I thought if I had a high sitting wood piece (on stilts, kinda) I could easily remove the wood to swill it once a week (I couldn't do this with the moss "tree"). The moss bunches salvaged from the previous "tree" are growing happily in my 15 litre "grow on" tank which only has plants and a couple of bladder snails in it.

Yesterday (when I did this rescape) I changed about 60-70% of the water. Tonight I did about the same. I'm wondering if I should do two of these changes a day - one in the morning and one in the evening. If it is that bacteria issue then I think I might have to. What a PITA!

The baby shrimp (I can spot about four or five) are getting pink now. I do hope they survive as they are very cute.

If anyone can think of anything I'm doing wrong or has any suggestions/pointers - please do chip in.

**talldutchie** · 03-18-2013, 08:25 PM

I'm out of options mate. If you're making errors I haven't found them

Another long shot.... catappa or indian almond leaf. Contains some kind of anti bacterial stuff that sometimes helps according a shrimp keeper I asked today.

**~firefly~** · 03-18-2013, 08:37 PM

Ahhh, I'm willing to try anything. Do you know a good online retailer for these? I looked on Amazon but it's £6.64 which is pricy...but it's £7.65 for delivery which takes the mick for a few leaves.

Until then I will keep up with the water changes.

You have me thinking about eggshells now though!