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I'm SO frustrated. Every time I think I've figured out what the problem is, they start dying again. I have a batch of shrimplets (about 10-14 days old) that seem to be doing fine, but the larger/older shrimp are the ones I'm losing.
I realized a while back that my tap water has nitrates in it and that the tank water was therefore pretty high in nitrates. I started doing RO water changes and that seemed to help, but then this past week, the shrimp have started dying again. 1-2 a day it seems. I'll be out of shrimp soon.
I'm just stumped. I've periods of great success with them, then the die offs start all over. I took several of the larger shrimp out and transferred them to the 16g tank right next to the one they're in now and those shrimp are doing great. Two of them are berried and the other three males look pretty happy. I don't feed those shrimp at all, they just forage for whatever the fish and snails don't eat or what they find on the plants and moss.
I've tried skipping feeding days with the shrimp in the main tank, thinking I was over feeding them and that had no effect - actually it might have made the die off worse. I added a feeding dish, which really seemed to help, but then again, after a while, the die offs started up again.
There's no ammonia, no nitrites, Gh/pH/KH are all in line with what works for RCS. I'm going to do another RO water change today since the nitrates are still hovering in the 20-30 range.
Could it just be the nitrates? I'm really struggling to figure this out. Tank is planted and has eco complete substrate.
I realized a while back that my tap water has nitrates in it and that the tank water was therefore pretty high in nitrates. I started doing RO water changes and that seemed to help, but then this past week, the shrimp have started dying again. 1-2 a day it seems. I'll be out of shrimp soon.
I'm just stumped. I've periods of great success with them, then the die offs start all over. I took several of the larger shrimp out and transferred them to the 16g tank right next to the one they're in now and those shrimp are doing great. Two of them are berried and the other three males look pretty happy. I don't feed those shrimp at all, they just forage for whatever the fish and snails don't eat or what they find on the plants and moss.
I've tried skipping feeding days with the shrimp in the main tank, thinking I was over feeding them and that had no effect - actually it might have made the die off worse. I added a feeding dish, which really seemed to help, but then again, after a while, the die offs started up again.
There's no ammonia, no nitrites, Gh/pH/KH are all in line with what works for RCS. I'm going to do another RO water change today since the nitrates are still hovering in the 20-30 range.
Could it just be the nitrates? I'm really struggling to figure this out. Tank is planted and has eco complete substrate.