Ah man I’m so sorry that happened! Never heard of using turtle sludge destroyer for the biofilm, I hope it works well. Let me know if that helps please! Would love to recommend it in the future if it does. Cherries can definitely be difficult in new tanks, but once they’re in a stable environment they grow like crazy! Went from 6 cherry shrimp to about 300 in my 38 gallon lol! That’s the best part of this hobby, always so much to learn 🙂 hopefully the plants start growing and offset that waste, if you don’t have it my favorite fast growing plant is Pogostemon stellatus octopus. That thing sucks up waste like crazy, and then you’ll have infinite background plants 😂 Might be a bit fast for a smaller tanks, but just something to try if the java fern and moss isn’t cutting it. Haha it definitely can be expensive! I’m very frugal with my setups so it can definitely be less expensive, and experience helps that too. Losing fish and shrimp sucks but I’m happy you’re sticking with it!