Ghost Shrimp and Betta in a 1 Gallon

[The Curious]

Hello AC. I just got ahold of a cool lil 1 gallon cylindar from my parents house and I have it set up with cycled water from my guppy tank. It contains 2 ghost shrimp, a small heater, a piece of driftwood, a good amount of willow moss, and a single shoot of anacharis. I am planning on getting a crown-tail betta from the ol' LFS in the next week or so to occupy the tank.

My question is how many ghost shrimp would be a good amount for this size tank with a betta as a tankmate? I was thinking about either having 6 or a dozen ghosts, but I wanted to get some additional input.

I've not kept shrimp before this last month, so I don't know too much concerning how many of them to get. As a rule of thumb, how many would be acceptable per gallon in a tank? Or is this a stupid question considering how little ammonia they produce?

Thanks for the advice guys.

[Neon]

I think 1 gal is too small for a betta....Frankly I think 1 G to be too small for any fish ....

[rich311k]

I agree with neon, that tank is not appropriate for a betta. You could do 5 shrimp or more if you want.

[korith]

1g is small especially once everything else gets put in it, something a bit bigger would better. For the shrimp they really have very little bioload so hard to overstock them, but 5-10 should be fine. Since you're in georgia, you can pick up a ghost shrimp 10 or 15 for a $1-2 at most pet supermarkets. They are sold as feeder shrimp.

The ghost shrimp may or may not survive in that tank, will depend on the temperament of the betta. I had a betta that lived in a 20 long with a 2 dozen or so ghost shrimp for a few months peacefully, then out of the blue there was a ghost shrimp massacre, all of them got taken out by the betta in a few days.

[The Curious]

OK...so if I do not get a betta could I put like 20 Ghost Shrimp in there?

Yeah my LFS sells em for 20 cents a pop...not too bad.

I just wanted to set-up some sort of cool lil nano tank and I thought this would be a good starter for that.

Any Ideas concerning a nano tank without fish?

On another note, could this lil one gallon support salt with a piece of live rock and some sort of coral instead of freshwater?

[korith]

OK...so if I do not get a betta could I put like 20 Ghost Shrimp in there?

Yeah my LFS sells em for 20 cents a pop...not too bad.

I just wanted to set-up some sort of cool lil nano tank and I thought this would be a good starter for that.

Any Ideas concerning a nano tank without fish?

On another note, could this lil one gallon support salt with a piece of live rock and some sort of coral instead of freshwater?

The ghost shrimp by themselves should be fine, 20 might be a bit too much for that small a space though. Could even try red cherry shrimp, they are smaller than the ghost shrimp. Also the red cherry shrimp will breed and the baby shrimp are just miniature versions of the adults. Low maintenance too.

No idea on the sw, usually they require more water to do stuff.

[VoidParadigm]

Does it have a filter? All you disclosed was a heater.
Cycled water doesn't mean anything. It's just aged. The bacteria in the filter is what keeps a tank cycled.

Also: If they suggested 5-10 shrimp why would you come right back with a question of whether 20 would be alright? =\
A betta wouldn't fit regardless, and thus 5-10 is the maximum stocking already.

[The Curious]

I was thinking 5 ghosts with a betta, but obviously there is not even enough room for a betta, so they meant 5 alone...sorry. I figured since the waste output from shrimp was so small they might be fine in a lil larger numbers than 5...so I asked.

I've been looking into small filters...not much selection...but I'm still looking and thinking about some sort of DIY project for it.

I might do just a couple red crystal shrimp.

If I were to do only a couple of inverts like this would I need a filter or would they do fine with just some heat and weekly water changes?

[VoidParadigm]

Most invertebrates are highly sensitive to nitrite and trate changes.
You need at least a sponge filter.

[korith]

Can get a small sponge filter run off an air pump. I think petsmart/petco have small box sponge filters for betta tanks that would work in your tank, doesn't take up much space.