Cleaner Shrimp

[scstone12]

Okay, iv had two cleaner shirmp , and both have died. #### is oging on. I have 2 clown fish, 1 baby chainlink mooray eel,bleeny and a koran tang. All are doing perfectly fine and healthy.. But my cleaner shrimp keep dieing.. Help please?

 

[Colin_T]

Marine cleaner shrimp usually die from poor water quality. If they are dieing within a day of being put in the tank then the water is bad or they are not being acclimatised over properly. Many people put cleaner shrimp into a bucket (with an airstone bubbling away), and have an airline dripping water from the main tank into the bucket. They allow the bucket to fill up over a couple of hours or even over the course of a day, and then pour the shrimp into the tank.

 

[fiskkeeperpro]

i had both my shrimp die in 24 hours of each other after having been in the tank for 6 months. I got advice, and it seemed like iodine levels were low meaning they couldnt shed and they died. Maybe this is the same for you??

 

[n3ont3tra]

Mine both died when my RO unit stopped filtering the water correctly..

 

[Aqua Duck]

Have you used any copper based medications? They're very intolerant of copper as are most invertebrates.

 

[scstone12]

no i havn't added any copper based medications. i ohnestly think its poor water quailty. Tnight im going to check everything and make sure its all propor and ill post my results and see if anyone can spot a problem.

 

[scstone12]

okay i checked everything i could, i think im missing a couple tests ...my ammonia was .40 , calcuim 280.. salinity 1.031 or 41... and my akalinity is 0. If im missing anything please let me know.

 

[Musho3210]

you dont need to be missing anything to know that something is wrong. The main thing is the salinity, now thats high, aim for 1.026 AKA 35 ppm. Second, ammonia HAS to be 0, third the calcium is looking a little down but thats probably not what killed the shrimp.

 

[scstone12]

Yes, i think its the salinty thats killing them , i was topping the water off with fresh and salt combined. From other forums i found out that when you top off your tank you use only fresh water.Thats deff what made my salinity so high.

 

[Colin_T]

Yep definitely the salinity and the ammonia. Shrimp don't tolerate high salt levels at all, especially if they are suddenly put into a tank with a completely different salinity to where they came from.

Any ammonia is going to be lethal in seawater due tho the high PH of the water. When the PH is below 7.0 ammonia isn't a big issue but as the PH goes up it becomes more and more toxic. Seawater has a PH around 8.4 and any ammonia in this water, even a tiny amount, would be extremely toxic. Invertebrates like crabs, shrimp, corals, etc are going to have problems if there is any ammonia in the water.

 

[scstone12]

okay legit, i got my salinity down and i went out and bought another cleaner shrimp.. and im good to go. Hes alive and healthy and cleaning fish like crazyyy... perfect. Thanks for the help