Ill Shrimp

[Gypsy5]

Hi all, wondered if any of you have any advice for a shrimp newbie? I bought 5 shrimp on Friday afternoon. I don't know the proper name of them as they were labelled "Plant cleaning shrimp" on the fish shop's tanks and they confirmed that that's what they were called!

Anyhow, we brought them home and placed them in a tank with our fish (it was confirmed that none of our fish should bother the shrimp). Saturday morning we found one crawling along the floor of the tank very unsteadily. Since then it has been on it's back/side with legs in the air. Still looks strong (is waving legs about madly when the water is disturbed) but doesn't seem to be able to get upright and stay up!

What should we do and what could be wrong? We have placed him in a quarantine tank today to stop our tetras picking on him (they got a little interested and started to peck a bit) but would love to be able to help him some more.

If he's survived for more than 24 hours like this he deserves a chance, poor guy.

 

[three-fingers]

First things first, can you get some water stats?
And would it be possible to take a picture of the shrimp?

 

[Invader Xan]

Erk... Sounds like some kind of poisoning. Unfortunately, a lot of things that are fine for fish aren't very nice for shrimp. Did they swim about frantically when you first put them in the tank, or did they all run and hide? Do you have any plants? Have you recently had to give your fish any meds?

In the meantime, just keep him warm (most shrimp sold will be comfortable around 22C) and in very clean, dechlorinated water. If you have any, give him a couple of strands of (thoroughly washed) java moss or something similar (a small moss ball would be ideal), in case he wakes up (he'll probably need something to eat).

 

[GoldLenny]

Could it just be the molted shell of a shrimp? Quite often, a shrimp will molt when being moved into a new tank.

 

[Gypsy5]

Well, he died in the night. Did a water test on the Thursday evening (always do a test before we get any planned fish) and again on the Saturday evening (the evening after he came home). Ammonia & Nitrite at 0, Nitrate at 10/20 on Thursday and 20/40 on the Saturday. All the shrimp eagerly set to work on the plants the moment they hit them! Looked like they were starving!!

Only meds added to the tank was liquid plant food on 24/04/07.

Was definitely a whole shrimp and not a shell.

R.I.P. Little shrimpy

 

[Invader Xan]

Hmmm... well, your stats seem ok, and as the first thing they did was to settle and eat (usually a good sign) it's probably not a hardness problem. Unfortunately, that fertilliser might just be the problem.

Sorry he didn't make it. If it's any consolation, you did everything right. Shrimp can be difficult to cater for.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

could be heavy metals, check your tank for copper or anything like that, does your dechlorinator remove heavy metals?

shrimp are particularly sensitive to it, we found after tinkering with the plumbing and putting in new copper pipes we found loads of our shrimp died after water changes, used double doses of dechlor for a while which seemed to resolve it.

 

[three-fingers]

Well, he died in the night. Did a water test on the Thursday evening (always do a test before we get any planned fish) and again on the Saturday evening (the evening after he came home). Ammonia & Nitrite at 0, Nitrate at 10/20 on Thursday and 20/40 on the Saturday. All the shrimp eagerly set to work on the plants the moment they hit them! Looked like they were starving!!

Only meds added to the tank was liquid plant food on 24/04/07.

Was definitely a whole shrimp and not a shell.

R.I.P. Little shrimpy

How about pH? I've seen similar reactions when the pH was too low for the poor shrimp.
They seemed perfectly fine for a few days, then two of them died just as described.
I did a water change and desperately tried to raise the pH, but after a week of adding shells, liquid calcium, ocean rock, doing multiple 50% water changes and adding a bag of coral sand to the filter, I had no success and the poor little guy passed on the same way.

Never underestimate the pH lowering power of ADA aquasoil, before I added the shrimp it was pH 6.5 and pH 6.8 after a water change.
A later test revealed it to be well under pH 6 .

But more likely as Miss Wiggle points out is heavy metals, most good water conditioners remove them, but I'm not sure if seachem prime for example does, and there's a host of cheap brands that don't either.

 

[Gypsy5]

The tap conditioner I use detoxifys heavy metals it says. PH is 7.2.

Was reading somewhere that putting the shrimp in a plastic bag for travelling can cause severe stress as they have nothing to cling on to. It said that the shop should have put a piece of netting in as well. They travelled home for a good 3/4 of an hour in the bag (did advise the guy in the fish shop how long it would take us). The remaining 4 shrimp are doing well so presuming it must have been weak to start off with. Just would have loved to have known if there was anything else I could have done.

Thanks for the replies everyone.