I have 1 ghost shrimp in my heavily planted 10g amazon QT. I am wondering if I can add a colony of between 10-20 without many problems. I am going out of town tomorrow, and the walmart we are stopping at (somewhat unfortunately) has fish. I can get the Ghost Shrimp for 33 cents a piece.

I heard somewhere that GS are cannibalistic, but I have heard others say they aren't (neither were on this forum, just GS care guides). Does anyone know if a colony between 10-20 would work Ok for a 10g tank? I am not going to risk smaller shrimp with my tetras. Lemons are fine with GS as far as I can tell, but hopefully I'll be getting some Black Widow Tetras some time this year. I guess I'll see how that goes when I get there, but $7 max for an impressive colony, even if it doesn't last (not that I would get an animal I knew would die), is a small price to pay.

Opinions?

Thanks!

small fry,

10 ghost shrimp should be fine in a heavily planted tank as they can get aggressive toward each other but only over territory usually, the rule of thumb is usually 1 shrimp per gallon but make sure and absolutely sure that you are getting a REAL GHOST shrimp because otherwise you might be getting a machrobracium which get extremely large and dangerous, they are aggressive machros and tend to kill small fish.

I googled this shrimp and some of the pics look just like Ghost Shrimp. I am wondering if those Machrobracium shrimp have little red dots on their hands. I have seen little red dots on my ghost shrimp's (or at least what I hope are ghost shrimp lol) and I am wondering if that is "normal".

Is there a way to tell the difference between the 2 species? I will probably get them at walmart if I can find them, and they sell their's for 33 cents a piece as "Ghost Shrimp". That is better, I guess, than getting it from an un-labled tank at a independant LFS.

Thanks for the information!

Ghost shrimp don't have long claws/forearms, machros do, ghost shrimp have ones that are almost non-existent they just look like little hooks in front of their faces.