Guppies, unsure of behavior and sex?

[Essjay]

Do you mean Sophie and Roney

We do intend to upgrade to a 10-20 gallon as of now, because my son couldn't be more excited and more in love with his fish, Sophie, Roney, and his shrimp, Raphael. Lol.

 

[Vengified]

Do you mean Sophie and Roney

Lol, ya, I know, my vernacular or punctuation isn't always on key. I blame auto correct.

We have added some new members to our family also. Just a few shrimp, as I've gathered their bio-load is rather small, and I want to progress very slowly. We got one Orange Bee shrimp I believe they called it, said it's just like red cherry, but orange. As well as two ghost shrimp. I actually think I got a male and a female, cuz one is enormous, and has a slightly different body shape.

I also am unsure of how they classify red cherry shrimp into fire red or sakura? Is it just if they are brighter, they are referred to that way? Or do they have to be a specific breed? Cuz our red cherry is super red, and red all through his legs, which online I red classifies as fire red?

Anyways, tank is doing great, levels all holding pretty steady. I check it every day, after 3 days or so, the ammonia might show a 0.05, just ever so slightly darker yellow color, but nowhere near the light green, so I do about a gallon water change, and it's back to 0.00. Nitrite is always 0.0, and nitrate is always between 0.0, and 0.25, usually on the lower side.

The shrimp are all molting too, which is good I think.

Thanks again every one! Especially you essjay. I'e actually made a little note in my Samsung note app on my note 8, and compiled your info into it, so I can reference it quickly! You have been more than helpful, and very kind and understanding. Your a good soul. All of you are, and I appreciate all of you!

 

[Essjay]

Word of caution about shrimps. It is not a good idea to mix different coloured shrimps of the same species. Wild cherry shrimps are a sort of brownish colour and if different colours breed you can end up with a tank of brownish shrimps. The variously coloured cherry shrimps were developed by selectively breeding and mixing them tends to revert the offspring to wild coloured.
If your orange shrimp is a bee shrimp that does suggest a different species, though shops do what they like with names, inventing them on occasion. The chart on here http://www.planetinverts.com/Will These Shrimp Interbreed.html does say you can keep red cherry and orange bee shrimps together. Ghost shrimps are a different genus again from both red cherry and orange bee, so they are OK as well.

 

[fozziebear]

Bee shrimps are fine to be kept together as you can actually produce nicer varieties through cross breeding, they are basically all mischling shrimps at the end of the day, i would agree about cherries though, keep them away from other types of shrimp or you will lose the bright red colouration over time.

 

[Vengified]

Hey there! I did get some plants, and some Marimo balls. Not my first choice in plants, but I suppose they will work, as LFS had no floaters. I may order a couple in the next week though. Didn't get any plants at first, as we were waiting on hood to come in, but it came today, and I went and got plants right away.

On another note, my tank seems to not be cycling whatsoever, and I'm hoping the plants may change that. For 10 days we have had this tank up, and every day, it's read between 0-0.25ppm Ammonia, and never once registered anything but 0 Nitrite/Nitrate. I know the cycling can take some time, but shouldn't I be seeing something besides ammonia? I have done water changes, all according to proper procedure with temp, conditioner, but nothing changes? I wouldn't think it would be cycled and show 0 Nitrates? I did put API quick start in it as well as StressZyme, but still, doesn't seem like it could have gone that fast?

@FisherFin those guppies, mine anyways, are referred to as Cobra or Snakeskin guppies. At least at the store I purchased them.

Anyways, here is a picture of the tank, redone with the new real plants, and some things moved around and cleaned up a bit! Hope you all like it!

* You can see guppies far left. "Raphael" (red cherry shrimp) on fake plant just to the right of them, in the far right corner on the gravel is "El Pedro" (one of ghost shrimp), and just up to the left of him, on one of the real plants, is "Pinecone" (bee shrimp). No clue where my son comes up with these names. He named the second smaller ghost shrimp "Mommy"

 

[FisherFin]

Oh ok thanks. The tank looks good! Nice Plants aswell!

 

[NickAu]

I would add a few stalks of Blue stricta along the back and some water sprite as floating, that should handle the ammonia,

I love duckweed, now most people will tell you that " once you put duck weed in your tank you cant get rid of it ", Thats true in a way, but only because it has nutrients, If your duck weed is growing like mad theres your answer.

 

[Vengified]

Thanks NickAu, I will check those out. I will have to order them though. Out of the 3 LFS here, none get many plants, especially in winter I've been told. And our winter seems to be about 8 months long, last week was in the negative 20s Fahrenheit. Which is why we don't get many plants, they don't ship well with that temperature extreme. So I guess I'll check eBay?

I am really hoping the plants help the nitrogen cycle though. I would think after 2 weeks I would see something besides ammonia. I don't really wanna mess with tetra safestart with shrimp in the tank, from what I've read the safestart causes ammonia increases, but you have to leave it, and not do water changes or water conditioner, and I don't know if they would handle it. In fact, Raphael already acting weird, has an off-white band head to toe, and then got a split sort of, halfway across his abdomen. It almost looks like he is stuck mid molt. He has molted twice successfully, but both times he hid, and we didn't see him for two days, then he showed up and his molt did too. We will see I guess.

 

[Vengified]

After checking around, I think the white band head to toe he gets, is camouflage. And I notice it only shows up after it gets brighter in the tank. It' the white band across his midsection I'm concerned about, and he is also MUCH paler than normal, usually he is a pretty deep red, now he's sort of translucent orange-red. I'll post a pic, if anyone knows of its cause or what's going on, feel free to let me know, thanks.