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Merrick

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  1. Wanted to close the loop on this for all the folks that chipped in with recommendation and suggestions. Some good news on the shrimp front. Significantly dialed back the feeding to around 2 times per week and added some Catappa leaves. Out of my starting 14 RCS I managed to stabilize and keep 4 alive. I should have had five left but dropped the lid into the water and pulled it out, unfortunately a shrimp had gotten on it and I did not notice it... so then there were four. On the plus side in early April I noticed one of the two remaining females was berried and it spawned earlier this week. So far I have observed two shrimplets and hopefully there are a few more in the tank. There is a fair bit of algae on the glass (by design), so it is hard to see the new ones. Again just wanted to thank everyone who posted, I appreciated the help!
  2. I moved the wood into the tank today and will see how things progress over the coming days. Also, good idea on the other leaves. Will probably see how the things go with Catappa and once the are used up move to dry fallen leaves. There are some hardwood trees in the neighborhood, so I can probably find some oaks leaves. Of course the neighbors may wonder why I am rummaging for leaves in their front yards... guess that will add an air of mystery about me... that or oddness... lol. Merrick
  3. Appreciate the posts! I'll check his videos as I have not seen them. I have some wood extra wood in my existing tank and I can move it over. I did purchase some Catappa leaves but haven't added them yet. Is there any preference between the wood and Catappa? I also pulled the fish out and it is shrimp only at this point, so going to feedings 2-3 times a week will be easy. When I got the shrimp I floated them to normalize the temp and then drip acclimated them before putting them in the tank. They were seemingly doing well until about week 2 when they started dying off. This has happened before with Amanos and the previous batch of RCS. Clearly, I am missing something which is a little frustrating. I had planned to keep them in this tank get them breeding and then transition them to the main tank. At this point just getting them to survive may have to be enough. It is pretty easy to pick up a calcium test kit, so I'll test and see what I have. Looking at our local water company it appears the water is sourced from the Potomac River. For a baseline I pulled the US Army Corp of Engineers water quality report and the calcium varied between 33 and 46 ppm over the course of 2021. Thanks for all the help.
  4. Thanks for the quick response. It is a quarantine tank and has only been setup since late December as the intent was to move everything to the main tank once out of quarantine. I used water from my existing tank initially and when I have done water changes I have used tap water after dosing the appropriate amount of Fritz complete. After reading this I did check the worms I had. There are some detritus and rhabdocoela, but I have not noticed any Planaria. I have been reducing the amount of food given the worms and the the detritus worms are about gone. There are still rhabdocoela in the tank. Hopefully, the reduced food will eventually take care of them as well.
  5. PH: ~7.5 Nitrates: ~25 Hardness: ~200 Nitrite: 0 Ammonia: 0 KH/Buffer:~180 Temp: 76F Looking for some insights as I am getting a bit frustrated not being able to pin down why my red cherry shrimp are dying off. While I don’t think this is a disease issue per se I am having a real issue keeping RCS alive. In way of background I brought 14 red cherry shrimp and some Pygmy Corys home from a LFS in Northern Virginia and 1-2 RCS have been dying every week or so. I am currently at ~6 remaining. I had set up a QT to hold the RCS and the Corys before moving both over into my main tank. The QT is a 5 gallon with a heater and a Finex clip on light. I pulled a bunch of things from the main tank for the QT including Watersprite, some Java moss, a sponge filter, some hardscape, and to start filled it with water from my main tank. I also added a thin layer of new gravel to hold some of the Watersprite down and an old heater. I have done the med trio and some water changes since the tank was set up in late December. To start with I had been feeding a mix of foods including BBS, frozen daphnia, fry food, and Hikari Shrimp Cuisine (there is some algae as well). Once the Corys came out of the QT I moved to Shrimp Cuisine and fry food. I am struggling to figure out what my misstep(s) are and wondering if folks have any suggestions/guidance? I am not seeing any sign of illness and it seems to be the larger RCS dying off. I had previously purchased 12 RCS from the same store about a year prior and placed them into my main tank (20 long) and lost all of them. I do have Amanos (did initially have about 50% attrition after getting them) in my main tank ( which is now ~2 years old) and was not positive the original batch of RCS weren’t predated in the main tank, so I have been keeping this new batch separate to isolate that variable. While they are not getting eaten clearly they are dying off. Thanks, Merrick
  6. Thanks! Appreciate all the help.
  7. Thanks. I had attributed the disease to Ich since there were no spots on the eyes and the spots seemed pure white. Suspect moving forward I will treat for Epistylis first as death appears to occur much sooner compared to Ich. WRT the spots for Ich are they truly flush on the fish?
  8. No spots on the eyes that I had noticed. How quickly does Epistylis/columnaris progress? Look like the cause if death had a 100% mortality rate and they all died within 8-12 hours of the first death. The big challenge I had was trying to differentiate between Ich and Epistylis. Ended up landing on the side of Ich and was apparently and clearly wrong. Any good tricks to the trade to tell them apart or when in doubt do you just treat for both? Dawn, WRT to white spots in the main tank after the fish were removed wonder if it is some of the Fry food decomposing. Thanks for the responses and thoughts I do appreciate it.
  9. Hoping I wasn’t going to have to post here, but just lost 6 of my 7 cardinal tetras today and the 7th is likely terminal and not sure on my next steps. A little bummed about the die-off as its suddenness was unexpected. As I am not sure what data is helpful, so I have included water params and significant events as it is a new tank. Tanks is a 20 long planted tank with following water params pH: running 7.4-7.6 Nitrates: 10-30 ppm Hardness: 10-12dgh Nitrite: 0 Ammonia: 0 KH/Buffer: 8-10dkh Water Temperature: 76F I have been running weekly checks of the above water params with a liquid kit. After I added the fish I added daily checks with Co-Op test strips and there were no elevated levels of ammonia or nitrites and the other values, excluding Nitrates, remained the same as well. Nitrate levels did vary a bit due to fertilizer additions and plant consumption. In terms of timeline and significant events I had the following: Mid-February set up tank with hardscape, eco-complete, Fluval 30 filter tweaked with course sponge and no carbon, heater, Stingray on a timer, and a small sponge filter with air stone. 1 March added Crypt Wendetti and Parva, Java Moss, Scarlet Temple, plus Water Sprite from the Co-Op. All but the moss died back (USPS took 8 days to deliver), but everything except the Scarlet Temple had started growing well. Water params were "good" and have been using Easy Green and a little Easy Iron. 26 March added seven Cardinal Tetras from a LFS (only fish in the tank) 29 March added some additional Water Sprite to replace the Scarlet Temple which never recovered. The new Water Sprite was and is growing very well. 3 April I noticed some spots that I took to be Ich on all the Tetras (pics attached), moved them to a 5 gallon hospital tank, and used the sponge filter from the 20 long. Temp was kept at 78F. 4 April realized I had accidentally under-dosed Ich-X (0.25ml v 2.5ml) and corrected to proper dose plus started daily 30% water changes followed by re-dosing. 4 April to 6 April fish seemed to be OK, other than spots, and were eating an alternating mix of fry food and frozen Daphnia. All fish appeared energetic and water params were consistent with main tank 7 April returned home from work and 6 of 7 tetras were dead with 7th appearing unlikely to survive. Did add some Maracyn for remaining fish as dead fish seemed to have some possible fin rot that I had not noticed while they were alive. My questions are: Did I miss diagnose (or miss treat Ich), was it Epistylis, or something else? The rapidity of death, fatality rate, and simultaneous nature seem odd. The following day after I had pulled the fish from the main tank I noticed some odd white growths (1-2mm and look like small white pills of cotton) on the moss and hair algae in the tank (pic attached). Curious what folk’s thoughts are on that? Other than being time coincident may be completely unrelated, but wanted to ask. Are my water parameters just too far outside of a Tetras required range? I had hoped to get a mix of Cardinal and Rummy-nose Tetras plus some Amano shrimp for the tank, but not sure on how to proceed at this stage as I don’t know what killed the Tetras I had. Thanks for any help or guidance, Merrick
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