Which Shrimp?

[LellowFish]

I currently only have one tank, my 66L. At the mo it houses 10 Neons and 1 Plec that is going to be rehomed ASAP. I was wondering what kind of shrimp I could get to replace the Plec for keeping the tank clean between WC's? If not shrimp, then snails would do.

Any advice is welcome!

 

[LellowFish]

Bump, any advice/reply is welcome!

 

[aly_starh]

IMO. shrimp dont really keep the tank clean, they will eat leftover food and abit of algea, but its snails that will eat everything, and keep the tank super clean.

Shrimp- cherry, ghost.
Snails- ramshorn, malasian trumpet, apple.

 

[three-fingers]

As above, no animal can clean the tank as a water change would do.

However, you could easily have shrimp and snails.

I would go for a few Amano shrimp (they are bigger and come out more often) and a couple of apple snails (buy nice colours off the internet).

A couple of nerite snails would be good, but beware that they can slowly starve is there isnt enough algae, so only get one or two.

Also, don't bother with snails if you have acidic water, as their shells will eventually corrode. pH 6.8 isnt much a problem as long as the snails are fed enough food that has the right minerals for inverts (like shrimp food) or if you dose some extra calcium into the water, but pH 6 would be deadly in the long run.

 

[LellowFish]

Right-ho, now the Plec has gone.

I do weekly water changes of 25% though it's more frequent than that as I had to add 12 Neons at once. pH never goes below about 6.6 on the weekly WC's.

I think I'm going to go for some Apple snails as there is a member here who is selling nicely coloured ones (candy-striped I think they are?). Or maybe I could ask the LFS if they have any pest snails?