Crystal Red Shrimps dying/dissappearing

[Aiden123]

After cycling my 15 gallon tank for 1-1 1/2 month I finally added 11 crystal red shrimps. After two weeks, 2 have been confirmed dead and quite a few have disappeared. During this period i noticed a steady decline in the amount I could see at once from the full 11 down to 4 today.

Tank inhabitants:
Crystal Red Shrimp
MTS

Vegetation:
Java moss
moss balls
bog wood
hortwort
Bacopa crenata / monier
Cabomba

Filtration:
Marina slim filter s15
diy air pump driven sponge filter

Tap water parameters:
Hardness Level Slightly Hard
Hardness Clark 9.00
Hardness French 13.00
Hardness German 7.00
Aluminium 7.25 μgAl/l
Chlorine 0.29 mg/l
Coliform bacteria 0.00 no./100ml
Colour 1.49 mg/l Pt/Co
Conductivity 338.23 μS/cm at 20°C
E.coli bacteria 0.00 no./100ml
Fluoride 0.35 mgF/l
Iron 22.50 μgFe/l
Manganese 2.90 μgMn/l
Nitrate 8.32 mgNO3/l
Odour 0.00
Pesticides 0.00 μg/l
pH 7.84 pH Value
Sodium 22.63 mgNa/l
Taste 0.00
Copper 0.02 mgCu/l
Lead 1.14 μgPb/l
Nickel 2.74 μgNi/l

Tank Water parameters:
Temperature 26c
ammonia 0.25
nitrite 0
nitrate 0
ph 7.4
I use interpret bioactive tapsafe to treat the water before adding to the tank.

I tested my tap water and it gives a reading of 0.25 for ammonia, from a little research i found that when chloramine is added during water treatment which could give a positive reading for ammonia. MY water treatment should remove this from the water so im guessing its testing positive for actual ammonia in the tank water which is strange as im 100% sure it is cycled. For cycling i place the half the sponge from the diy filter from my cherry tank onto the diy filter for the crystal tank. I then used the food method to cycle the tank and then performed a water change to bring the parameters to a safe range. It does seem that no matter what i do, i cannot get rid of the 0.25 ammonia reading.

I would normally jump straight to the conclusion that the ammonia was the culprit however, the shrimp that do remain are so active and brightly coloured whereas the ones that died/disappeared showed signs that the white colouring was getting duller and in some cases became completely clear but the red stayed bright and solid. I would have thought that if ammonia was the problem all the shrimps would be affected.

Can anyone point me in the right directions to prevent anymore deaths because i want to get it sorted before adding more to replace losses. Also any ideas on how to get my ammonia down to 0?

Thanks for your time and help
Some pictures to help:
20130830_192301.jpg20130830_192308.jpg

[talldutchie]

What chemicals are you using? Is there anything metal in there?

[KevinVA]

.25ppm ammonia is enough to kill small shrimp like these. They're not all going to die at the same time, as it will effect each shrimp differently (it'll take more time for some to die and some might not die at all, after the ammonia is finally cleared).

For a while there, I was getting .25ppm ammonia from my tap and found out that it wasn't free ammonia, but ionized. Your bb will take care of it, but if it's only established to take care of xxppm and you introduce an additional .25ppm with your tap, it's going to take longer to oxidize all of the ammonia and will likely create additional nitrites that your nitrospira isn't ready to eat. So, you're probably going to have to go through a mini-cycle, until your BB is established to take care of the additional ammonia.

That being said, if you could increase your plant footprint, you could probably nullify the effects of the ammonia. Maybe add some frog bit, duck weed or water sprite?

[Aiden123]

The only chemical I use is interpret bioactive tapsafe and the only metals come from the tap water which the interpret treatment claims to take care of.

Kevin, how long would this mini cycle take? I have the exact same problem with my red cherry tank and that has been up and running since the beginning of april with around 200 shrimp in. No matter what I try, in both tanks there is 0.25 ammonia but doesnt seem to bother the cherries as much as the crystals.

I have thought about sourcing my tank water from different sources. Using bottled water would be a real hassle, I would have to buy quite a few big bottles of water from my local store and it would be expensive over time. A 5 litre bottle is about £1.50 for me.

Done a little bit of research into RO but the cost for the benefit isnt really enough to justify getting one for my small tanks.

Also regarding extra plants, my cherry tank is full of vegetation and still has the problem.

[Aiden123]

Could the ph and the temperature also be causing issues?

[talldutchie]

PH is a touch low and the temp a bit on the high side. Still if you get some o2 in there it should be fine.

[Aiden123]

I thought they preferred slightly acidic ph? I'm planning on getting a fan system for the tank soon, just want to figure out the current problem first. There is already an airstone inside the tank and plenty of water movement so hopefully the o2 is adequate.
I have on order a tds tester and gh + kh test kits on order a long with some indian almond leaves which will hopefully help a bit.

[Aiden123]

TDS meter has arrived and I have just took a reading. The tank came out at 218 TDS and from a quick internet search, its appears the TDS range for these shrimps is 100-180, so could this also be contributing to my shrimp deaths?

[Aiden123]

On a side note, i wish i had this TDS meter from the start. It also gives me a digital temperature reading, meaning i can match exactingly the temperature of the tank with the water change water. Was an absolute bargain in my opinion a must have piece of equipment.

[Aiden123]

I may have just found the answer to my problem, literally in my back garden. Just did a partial test on the water that comes out of a hose on the tap outside:

Ammonia: 0.00
Nitrite: 0.00
Nitrate: 0.00
TDS:142 (this is great as the current tap i use produces a 212 tds reading
Ph: 7.4-7.6 (not sure exact ph, its a darker blue than the 7.6 blue on normal ph test but definitely comes up as 7.4 on high range ph test)
Temperature: It comes out the tap at 20c so wouldn't take long to get it up to the right temperature
GH + KH: I'll test these when my test kit arrives, fingers crossed that it follows these previous encouraging results