Stuck in a molt

[Seanwoodey]

Hey guys I’ve got a shrimp stuck in a molt. Is there anything I can do or should have done?

[nabokovfan87]

Essentially you can put the shrimp into a net gently and keep an eye out. Float the net at the top of the tank and if the shrimp molts fully it will be able to get out.

Sometimes they get stuck and get attacked and that stress ends with them dying.

Whenever I see something like this I do a sanity check and I feed the colony a complete type of food with calcium/minerals.

What is your GH and KH in the tank? How is filtration setup? When was the last water change and how was that water change completed? How much water was changed?

Did anything else change recently on the tank?

Edited October 10, 2023 by nabokovfan87
typo

[Seanwoodey]

It’s gone now, can’t see a dead shrimp but also can’t see a molt. So who knows what’s happened 

[nabokovfan87]

Check to see if someone ran off with it? Should be shiny if it's a new molt.

[Seanwoodey]

I have recently done a water change about a week ago. Changed about 10% and replaced the water using drip method.

 

I still haven’t bought the kits to check GH and kh

[nabokovfan87]

How big is the tank?

[Chick-In-Of-TheSea]

Shrimps will eat dead shrimp. Then again, they will eat molts too. So it could have gone either way. Try to limit the amount of meat-based protein they get. That tends to hinder molting. I like shrimp-specific foods or Repashy Soilent green.

Edited October 10, 2023 by Chick-In-Of-TheSea

[Seanwoodey]

Hi Nabokovfan, my tank is 25l.

 

Hi Chick_in_of_the_sea, thanks. Rightly or wrongly ive been making food for my shrimp/snails based on the below youtube vid. But also use tetra crisps, bug bites
 

b

[Chick-In-Of-TheSea]

On 10/10/2023 at 11:08 AM, Seanwoodey said:

Hi Nabokovfan, my tank is 25l.

 

Hi Chick_in_of_the_sea, thanks. Rightly or wrongly ive been making food for my shrimp/snails based on the below youtube vid. But also use tetra crisps, bug bites
 

b

Oh excellent. Food for snails is great for shrimps too. 🙂  I really like that channel and have learned a lot from her.

[Lennie]

I solved my molting problems by adding Montmorillonite clay. Maybe you can give it a try

 

[Seanwoodey]

Sounds interesting, may give that a go!

[Seanwoodey]

So bad day another dead shrimp (has the white ring so maybe during a molt). This was a good shrimp too.

I’ve done a decent water change and gravel vac, moving the large bog wood in the back, which I never do. The fresh water is now dripping back into the tank.

however during this I have noticed 2 berried shrimp that were hiding, so now I’m concerned that they will drop their eggs as I have stressed them

Edited October 11, 2023 by Seanwoodey

[Seanwoodey]

You never feel like you know what’s going on, or what to do for the best. It feels like this may be my last attempt

[Seanwoodey]

Definitely dropped some eggs

[nabokovfan87]

On 10/11/2023 at 12:09 PM, Seanwoodey said:

You never feel like you know what’s going on, or what to do for the best. It feels like this may be my last attempt

So let's take a deep breath and double check what we need to double check.

First thing we must do is make sure they have a complete food.  Calcium aside, there are other minerals and things your shrimp need to molt and develop properly.  This matters a lot moreso for things like developing young shrimp as opposed to just the adults.  Adults in a new environment it also matters a bit moreso than ones you've bred and raised yourself.  I have info from some shrimp breeders where they have used veggie versions of cichlid food as a staple for their breeding tanks.  That being said, making your own food is perfectly fine, but for now, given the issues you're experiencing, let's isolate food and nutrients as another variable.  Hikari has a pretty good shirmp food as well as a few others.  Nordic is available, looks really good, and is pretty affordable as well.  You can even try something like discus food from hikari.

A GH/KH kit is under $10 usually and it's been a monumental tool for me keeping shrimp.  Once you have those values for your tank and tap, please share and we can go from there.  The other key thing to track here is going to be nitrates and keeping them lower if you continue to experience issues.  (nitrates from waste specifically).  If you have nitrates only from your fertilizer, those are generally acceptable up into the 30's without issues.

You mentioned earlier about changing 10% of the water.  My suggestion would be to change at minimum 20% if you can.  I recommend only doing that at minimum every 2 weeks.  If you change it any more often, that results in some issues with molting and their schedule.  Based on the photo it looks like you're close to that already.  The main reason for this is because it's slightly important to remove nitrates / waste as much as it is to replace that with fresh clean water.  If you don't remove enough, you end up with OTD (old tank syndrome).  That, for shrimp, can be pretty detrimental and lead to some issues like exactly what you're seeing.  I'm not saying that's guaranteed what this is, but it's a potential explanation.

One final note here, if you can, add an airstone.  It helps with their immune system and just their general overall health.  Let's also just verify filtration to see if there's anything there.

As a sidenote... are you able to change the power level on the light?

[Seanwoodey]

Ok, first I’ll order a GH/KH kit.  Although my current test strips don’t show GH and KH there are other things like hardness and ph so I’ve took a photo that may help
 

with regards to food, (keeping in mind I have danios in the tank), I use bug bites, tetra crisps, flaked tetra goldfish food, sinking shrimp pellets, frozen bloodworm, snowflake and finally the food I’ve made. I have a feeding dish but I rarely see the shrimp in it. Maybe I need to drop the food near the back where the Java fern/bog wood is as they like to hide in and under that.

I use test strips weekly to measure nitrates/nitrites and they tend to be close to zero. I tend to do water change every 2 weeks but I agree that 10% doesn’t feel enough. Also worth noting that in the last water change I forgot to clean the sponge filter.

I’ve got a sponge filter, not big but apparently (according to Amazon it’s for 20 to 75 l) https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/B09Q2TZCS2?psc=1&ref=ppx_pop_mob_b_asin_title

I have been thinking of getting something so that I can run another sponge filter or sit stone from the same pump though

 

 

Edited October 11, 2023 by Seanwoodey

[Seanwoodey]

I’ve just found that total hardness and total carbonate is GH and KH. They’re very high so does this matter

[nabokovfan87]

On 10/11/2023 at 2:36 PM, Seanwoodey said:

with regards to food, (keeping in mind I have danios in the tank), I use bug bites, tetra crisps, flaked tetra goldfish food, sinking shrimp pellets, frozen bloodworm, snowflake and finally the food I’ve made. I have a feeding dish but I rarely see the shrimp in it. Maybe I need to drop the food near the back where the Java fern/bog wood is as they like to hide in and under that.

There is a lot to digest here and it's a little tough to say what is really going on.

First, you have slow growing plants (lots of ferns and anubias) and that does play a role.  You'd want to see some nitrate so those plants have what they need.  You can turn down the light if you notice them getting a lot of algae too.

I had experienced in my own tank that because the fish were in there, the shrimp were afraid to get food out of the dish.  You can try feeding them at night and maybe that helps a little bit.  That being said, it's tough.  The bug bites and those things, when you're feeding the fish normally it would mean that some of that goes to the shrimp.  You very likely will rarely need to feed the shrimp as a result of this, at least until you see the colony double or triple in size.  Feeding them where they do tend to congregate is a good idea as well!

The filter seems to be the setup where I would run one on each side of the tank and be ok.  As long as you're not seeing something like ammonia or nitrite, then you should be ok with what you currently have.  adding an airstone on the other side, maybe that just helps overall.  If you notice the shrimp only staying around where the airflow is, then that usually indicates they may want more air to feel comfortable exploring other parts of the tank.  If you do end up with two sponges in there, you can also alternate the week(s) that you clean them.  That should be more than adequate.

 

On 10/11/2023 at 2:36 PM, Seanwoodey said:

Does this look the same as your tap water or very different?

[Seanwoodey]

thanks, it’s difficult isn’t it. My tap water is the same as the tank with the exception of chlorine, which is a lot higher.

im hoping the berried shrimp actually have the babies, then it may get a little better 

[Seanwoodey]

@nabokovfan87 just wanted to mention I took your advice by adding a second filter

[nabokovfan87]

Looks good!  I had to mess with mine yesterday. Pollen feeding day.

One day the plants will come. 😂

[Seanwoodey]

That’s a very cool looking tank

[nabokovfan87]

On 10/19/2023 at 2:58 PM, Seanwoodey said:

That’s a very cool looking tank

Thanks!  I wish I had a better scape, but it works well.  It looks so empty in that photo! In person the scale of things is great though.  I am excited for when I can add more moss and other decor items.