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Help! My CRS are acting really odd/ dying?!?!?

Vinkenoog1977

Vinkenoog1977

Member
Joined
14 Apr 2014
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560
Location
The Hague, Netherlands
Hey guys,

Just a quick, panicky question; my Crystal Reds are going nuts, and by that I mean, suddenly swimming a short distance, sometimes upwards, other times straight forward, and then "passing out" for a while; they sink down on their backs, and just lay there for a bit. They all look very lethargic at the moment.
Things were fine until about a half an hour ago, when I decided to do some trimming and a WC (50%); it basically started when I started trimming. My hands were not tainted with anything as far as I know, and the water parameters are all just fine, and identical to normal. Maybe stress, but that would be a first, they've never acted like this when I was doing maintenance before.
What could be causing this, and should I be worried? It looks like they're all about to keel over. :(

Any help is welcome, did a quick Google, but found nothing.

Thanks!
 
Did you add any new plants? This sounds precisely like the insecticide poisoning that a number of us have experienced when adding plants imported from the far east.

http://www.ukaps.org/forum/threads/warning-shrimp-and-pesticides.19609/#post-198862
http://www.ukaps.org/forum/threads/wipe-out.19481/page-5#post-202007

Either way, I'd recommend doing a further 95% water change (or even two). Dilution is your only chance here really, otherwise I'd expect a very high mortality rate by tomorrow. I guess the worst possible situation if you haven't added anything new to the tank is your water supply being contaminated with something, in which case netting the shrimp into a bucket containing water from a different tank might be the best option, if possible.

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news and good luck.
 
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Thanks for the reply Tom.

And no, no new plants at all, and as said, it started before the water change, during trimming, and before that, everything was fine.

I do have some planaria in this tank, only noticed them earlier this week, and have taken most out by hand, and was planning on using Biomax No-Planaria to kill off the rest (haven't used it, cause it was on backorder); could the planaria have anything to do with it? Can't imagine since, again, it started when I was trimming the plants.
Could it simply be stress? Every time I walk to the tank to check them out, they freak out again.

Will do two more BIG WC, if this keeps up.

Thanks again![DOUBLEPOST=1405609081][/DOUBLEPOST]No, no easyCarbo Allan.
 
I'm dubious about either trimming stress or planaria as a trigger to be honest. Your description does perfectly match the sort of neurotoxic reaction some of us have had the misfortune of seeing previously but I guess there could be another cause. Get water changing :)
 
Hi, I was thinking temperature, ours are going mad at the moment, with the heat( weather)You haven't nocked your heater dial have you whilst trimming ? Our lights are off korilina is churning the surface and they are settling down with the higher oxygen.As for your unwanted guests I've just treated our sons tank with crs using cat wormer powder diluted in ro Un measured and just poured it in over two days no shrimp lost and all planaria seem to have gone. I have read others have done this so I thought I'd try it on a small no of lower grades. First treatment was a week ago. The main of our shrimp are going tomorrow as I don't have time at the moment and I don't want to go away and come home to a floor covered in dried up shrimp.:( on the plus side our sons tank will have the nicest looking ones and I'm going to gass my plants in the lounge tank..... again once there's no crs cbs in there.:D
 
First, well, actually second off course, WC is done. Will wait an hour, and then do another one. Things are looking not good.[DOUBLEPOST=1405610342][/DOUBLEPOST]Hey Kirk. Temp was the first thing I thought off, but that's a stable 24 C, as always. Was thinking maybe a lack of oxygen, but then I would again expect there to be some gradual change in behaviour, and not just when I do maintenance. I hate coincidences.
I did shut off the CO2, not that there is too much going in there, but was planning on quitting CO2 on this tank, because of the insane amount of growth per week. I have some decent surface movement as well.

No (positive) changes so far.
 
Did you or someone around you use any aerosols/perfume or smoke around the tank? That could cause problems to shrimps. I've almost lost a colony of red cherries due to a family guest spraying perfume around my tank while I was out.
 
If I'm honest co2 has given me nothing but sleepless nights days lost pacing up and down past the tank checking on our little beauties. I will never run hightec with crs again it's hard enough to keep the balance right with plants and putting crs into the equation makes it harder( I hardly use ferts with the crs as I'm scared I'll kill them).. I think they are much happier low tech my 9yr old son has proved this with his lowtec tank only changing water once a fortnight clever little devil. I think your water change hopefully will sort yours out. Did you say you use ro?[DOUBLEPOST=1405611183][/DOUBLEPOST]Oh forgot to say good luck fingers crossed for you and hope you or one of us on here work out the problem, just try not to panic like I have to many times.
 
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Michael: no perfume or aerosols. I do smoke, but not directly around the tank.

Kirk: I'm going low tech with them as well, same with the Crystal Blacks; just disconnected the CO2 on that one as well. And I don't use RO, just tap water with Seachem Prime. They still look miserable, most of them, the little ones are losing some colour as well (which brings me back to maybe stress???), but some others appear to be going back to normal.
And no panic, not too much I can do, besides another WC. Thanks for the help so far guys!
 
Ah I see. What is your tds? Our water is coming out of the tap today at 395-420 so I need ro here.
 
I put my money on your water then, tds too high maybe something in it they don't like , I could be wrong I lied earlier I've just checked my water and it's coming out of the tap at over 500!!!!.[DOUBLEPOST=1405612272][/DOUBLEPOST]You beat me to it darrel:D
 
Also this may be far fetching but do you know if there are any maintenance involving pipe works etc to do with how the water will arrive at your tap around your area? If there is there may likely be more chlorine than usual going into the water because of the works. It's not unheard of that this can be problematic to aquarium life.

Edit: Ignore that then if it was before water changes.
 
Things seem to be calming down a bit; the adults appear to have recovered, pretty much, the little ones are still having a bit of a tough time, even though they are no longer jumping all over the place, and are, slowly, starting to clean some hairgrass (and by slowly, I mean their actual pace).[DOUBLEPOST=1405612668][/DOUBLEPOST]Double checked, and even did a quick test on the tap water itself, before Seachem Prime, and that's just fine, even chlorine is well below the limit!

I still think it was just stress, I saw the same behaviour when I ordered some shrimp online, and they arrived in a right state, completely lost their colour, and were going mental. I just don't know what stressed them out so bad.[DOUBLEPOST=1405612806][/DOUBLEPOST]P.S.: no work on the water mains, and the TDS from the tap should be around 130 (according to my water supplier), with a conductivity of 125 mS/m.
 
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