# Err..Shrimps?



## Cook.MN (Mar 11, 2008)

So a thread here got me all excited about some shrimp, I went and bought 40 of them and when I received them in the mail they were TINY...as in most of them were below 1/4 in.

I put them in my tank about 7 hours ago and now I can't see even 1 of them. This tank has a nice thick java moss carpet...what are the chances that any of my shrimp are still alive?

Tank has Apisto's, Bolivian Rams, Corys and some Loaches.


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## illy-d (Nov 6, 2005)

there's a chance - provided they have lots of cover... I had a friend that had a 55g planted tank with a full slate wall along the back that had similar stocking to yours and his shrimps thrived... That being said cichlids will eat whatever they can catch and fit in their mouth!


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## apistomaster (Jun 22, 2006)

I wouldn't hold my breath.

I raise shrimp and Apistos. If a few Apistos grow up with the shrimp, quite a few make it.
Adding shrimp to an established SA Dwarf Cichlid tank was just an exercise in feeding them an expensive live food.


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## Dutch Dude (Sep 14, 2006)

Depends on the tank inhabitants. I have no difficulties at all of keeping shrimp and Bolivians in one tank. I have to say I introduced abouth 150 at once. The shrimp are everywhere, underneath the plants, behind the driftwood and on top of the big leaves of the Echinodorus. My Bolivians won't bother to feed on adults but only feed on the tiny baby shrimp. Because the high number of shrimp the production of baby's is high to and the losses will be compensated. The number of shrimp even increased to abouth 250.

I tried to add 50 of them with Guianacara and tetras. The Guianacara snacked on them but I never expected tetras (head and tail light) to show such a piranha like behaviour! They riped apart shrimp in no time! So all were gone in abouth 3 day's!

When the shrimp hide in the java mos or in small aria's they will be hard to detect. Mine come scavenge the bottom during night and feel more secure between the plants and wood during the day. If your tank is heavy planted or does contain a lot of hiding places for the shrimp they will have a fair chance of survival. You can create some extra shelter by putting in a larger flat stone or part of wood that is placed on a few pebbles so it will float abouth 1/4 inch above the substrate. This would be a save spot for the shrimp and you can still check on them.


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## DirtyBlackSocks (Jan 24, 2008)

Chances are the loaches are making meals out of them - they're one of the natural foods.

Only advice I can give is make sure you've got a lot of small crevices for them to hide in when they molt - but the tank inhabitants you're describing are no good for shrimp.

I've had clown loach and cory cats devour full grown 6" shrimp during molts - alls you find is a peice of the tail.


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## Cook.MN (Mar 11, 2008)

For $40 ~I~ could have had a steak and tail dinner!


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## Dutch Dude (Sep 14, 2006)

> For $40 ~I~ could have had a steak and tail dinner!


Instead your fish did. I expect the Apisto's to be the biggest threat for the shrimp.


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## Cook.MN (Mar 11, 2008)

Well, in another thread I heard of some surviving and reproducing and it was a nice balance of having shrimp thrive as a clean up crew and some getting eaten.

Oye!


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## DirtyBlackSocks (Jan 24, 2008)

it's hit or miss dude - there might be a few survivors but you won't see them swimming around - if at all like you would if it was a shrimp only tank, they hide out and avoid detection when there are predators in the tank.


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## Cook.MN (Mar 11, 2008)

I was wondering why my male cacatuoides was moving around the tank to keep me in sight this morning...he didn't want to miss another shrimp meal!


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## DeadFishFloating (Oct 9, 2007)

:lol:


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## Dutch Dude (Sep 14, 2006)

Bolivians won't feed on adults and the adults know,...the pic says it all.










And here a pic of the upper part of my tank. You can see the huge number of shrimp on just a small part of the tank.


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## Cook.MN (Mar 11, 2008)

I have a pair of Apisto's in the tank and I believe they were the eaters...or the cory cats.


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## blairo1 (May 7, 2006)

If you had Chameleon shrimp then that'd be a different story, you'd have to watch your fish, not the other way round. I had a chameleon shrimp (big boy he was too) that caught and ate my favourite Angel fish - it wasn't an adult, but still a good size and the shrimp had clamped on and that was that, I came down to find him waving the finless Angel around like a victory flag, git.

It's an expensive lesson bud, but your fish are going to thrive because of it so don't take it too hard - I had 20 odd amano shrimp (at full size they would be fine as they are quite substantial and mine lived with loaches, Bolivians, Pelvicachromis etc) and they lived in the tank with my big Rotkeil for quite some time, but one day he figured out that they tasted _really_ good and started shrimpin', after about a week he'd polished off nigh on 100 $ worth of Amano shrimp :lol:.

To add further insult to injury he also got hold of my rock shrimp, hehe, well pictures tell a story better than words:











To be fair had it not been for the Sev I'd still have my Amano's to this day although even the Blue Rams managed to kill one working as a pair (they did have fry) but that was a one off.

What kind of shrimp did you get exactly, I might have missed it...

Part of the learning curve bud, part of the learning curve (steep huh!)

Blair.


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## Cook.MN (Mar 11, 2008)

Just some Cherry, I'm starting to get some hair algae growth on my driftwood and heard that shrimp were the best ones at cleaning it off.

However the shrimp I got in were so small, most of them were white which I'm pretty sure means they were younger then juvies. I see that I still have like 2-3 of them left, and the ones that are left are actually fully red so must be the adults.


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## blairo1 (May 7, 2006)

Yup, cherry shrimp are not something I would put in with any Cichlid, well, you'd have to be careful of any fish. But I know my Bolivians would have eaten cherry shrimp given half a chance!

Amano shrimp did a fantastic job in my tank of keeping everything nice and clean, they do get a bit bigger (especially if they feed well) and they like to explore - it wasn't that rare to come down in the morning to find one halfway to the door :lol: but they are a lot tougher, mine would take a few whacks from territorial/hungry enough fish and they'd just ping off at a million miles an hour like they do.

You could hear them when the Sev hunted them at night as they flick to jump clear of the water in attempt to evade the predator, but there being a canopy right above them you'd hear, bang, bang.........bang.....bangbangbangbangbang!!!!

:lol:

My _Crossocheilus siamensis_ does the heavy work when it comes to algae duty though, plus I've never had problems with him chasing/attacking other fish or actually eating plants. He will chase the corydoras on occasion but I think he just does this to feel like the boss of _something_.

What size tank is this again bud?


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## Cook.MN (Mar 11, 2008)

It's a 55 gallon tank, going to go google (wow that was a log of "g's") crossocheilus siamensis.

I assume it's hair algae as it's something my BN plec wouldn't touch and it does have the appearance of hair...but it's only on the driftwood.


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## Cook.MN (Mar 11, 2008)

Oh and you should have a breeder section on your Ram site...so people like me can look for some local (as in local country) breeders


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## blairo1 (May 7, 2006)

SAE - Siamese Algae Eater aka _Crossocheilus siamensis_, the master keeper of all plants, eater of algae, bringer of hope.......

Just make sure you get a true SAE if you do decide to try it out, there is another - the Chinese Algae Eater, it gets much bigger, it can be aggressive (to the extent of chewing on other fish) and it's rubbish at eating algae.....

The way you tell is:

Crossocheilus look like this-









*What are you looking for! *

The stripe through the tail. If it ends at the base of the tail fin, its CAE, if it continues right to the edge of the actual tail fin, it's a SAE... I thought this was a good pic as he is a bit stressed, he doesn't like the camera and I was chasing him about trying to get a pic for you :lol: but it works quite well as their colours are usually weaker in the LFS - however faint, you CAN see that stripe running right to the edge of his tail fin and not just stopping at the base. If you click it it's 800 pixel width so you can see it a bit better.

In case you're not 100%, these are amano shrimp (for future reference):

















Much tougher than Cherry shrimp and IME they seemed to do a darn good job of keeping things clean.

Blair.

Re breeding on the BRC - I'm thinking about it and a few have made the suggestion now, but it would only be something to possibly introduce later, I'm really busy for the next week so I barely have time to work on the site at all anyway.

I also have to be careful because I have to ensure that I am not making a profit from this site, that I am not advertising or promoting a commercial product, etc, in order for me to be able to talk about it on forums. So if I were to integrate a breeding market, I would really have to sit down and have a chat with people in the know, about how to isolate myself from that in a way which enabled me to still be a neutral party - I want the site to help people and if people want to trade fish that's great, I just don't want it to be perceived that I want or intend to make money from this site, it's not my aim . It would make it much harder for me to get the information to EVERYONE, easily and readily, THAT is my aim.

:thumb:


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## peterl (Nov 27, 2006)

I concur with blairo. I keep full grown amano shrimp with my bolivians with no problems. They od a great job keeping plants and driftwood clean.

I tried chucking in a few small tiger and red cherry shrimp. I think they lasted about 30 minutes.


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## macclellan (Nov 30, 2006)

Only thing is Amanos don't reproduce in freshwater.

I've had the best luck with wild-type cherries, aka Minami shrimp, aka _Neocaridina heteropoda_. These aren't too common (except in my tank  ) but if you can get some, they do quite well. They breed as fast or faster than normal cherries and have chameleon coloration, changing from nearly clear to almost black, so they blend in better.


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## Cook.MN (Mar 11, 2008)

blairo1 said:


> Re breeding on the BRC - I'm thinking about it and a few have made the suggestion now, but it would only be something to possibly introduce later, I'm really busy for the next week so I barely have time to work on the site at all anyway.
> 
> I also have to be careful because I have to ensure that I am not making a profit from this site, that I am not advertising or promoting a commercial product, etc, in order for me to be able to talk about it on forums. So if I were to integrate a breeding market, I would really have to sit down and have a chat with people in the know, about how to isolate myself from that in a way which enabled me to still be a neutral party - I want the site to help people and if people want to trade fish that's great, I just don't want it to be perceived that I want or intend to make money from this site, it's not my aim . It would make it much harder for me to get the information to EVERYONE, easily and readily, THAT is my aim.
> 
> :thumb:


Very understandable on that end of things. I'm more thinking of the buyer's side where they know that they're getting some good quality Bolivians so they don't get the smoke and mirrors BS pulled on them that happened to me.

And I really think that with some of the Bolivians I have seen on your sight if people saw those around then they'd be all about the Bolivians over the Blues!  Because people like the Blues over the Bolivians for looks but the fish I have seen on your sight are extremely good looking fish. If I could get my hands on some of that quality I wouldn't even look at the Blue's personally.


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## blairo1 (May 7, 2006)

You're on the right road there, I think so anyway!

I'm glad you feel that way about Bolivians, it means a lot because it shows that at least some are beginning to look at the Bolivian differently, to actually appreciate subtlety over the strikingly obvious. They are a spectacular fish and I think that even some of their owners don't really realise or appreciate them until they properly understand and/or interact with them (which is not a fault, it's just dependant on what level you want to take it to) - which is what all the articles, advice and general pushing is all about, to increase the appreciation and understanding.

Well it seems to have worked with at least one person and that's something!

:thumb:


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## Chrispy (Apr 8, 2006)

I have had great luck with shrimp, once I throw them in, I lose about half to my festivums and sevs initially, but the rest make it. They are amazing at hiding if you have a little bit of cover. I use ghost shrimp that i get 4 for a $1.


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