Stopping my Amanos disappearing into the filter!

[colmans]

So 16 Amanos went in total a week ago and they all promptly disappeared after a day. Eventually I found a bunch today in the Biomaster canister. I get a feeling they must be getting in via the Aquascaper skimmer that i have set up as I can't see another way that they can get in.

How do others stop their shrimp getting in the external filters if they're using skimmers like this? Or do I need to ditch these skimmers and move to the Eheims?

Cheers

Johnny

 

[Sammy Islam]

Following as i'm about to set up a new tank with that filter. I guess they cant get past the prefilter so thats a bonus?

 

[Ed Wiser]

Shrimps love to sit on the intake of filters so I alway use screens on my tanks with shrimps.
I found these work well. There is another brand that uses a grey rubber seal. But the fit is too tight. I broke an intake I tried it.

 

[UsAndThem]

If you think they are getting in through the surface skimmer , I remember seeing someone using one that only worked periodically. it would remain closed and open only so often to avoid any shrimp from getting in. I'm going to try and find it for you

 

[Onoma1]

If you think they are getting in through the surface skimmer , I remember seeing someone using one that only worked periodically. it would remain closed and open only so often to avoid any shrimp from getting in. I'm going to try and find it for you

Jurijs mentioned using a separate skimmer on a timer. This allows you to schedule time when its turned off to allow the shrimp to escape from the skimmer. I have moved to this approach using a normal intake for the filter with the intake guard described by @Ed Wiser above bought from Aquasabi rather than a skimmer intake.

I couldn't find the exact pro tip where he mentions this, however, this one shows the skimmer.

 

[Wookii]

So 16 Amanos went in total a week ago and they all promptly disappeared after a day. Eventually I found a bunch today in the Biomaster canister. I get a feeling they must be getting in via the Aquascaper skimmer that i have set up as I can't see another way that they can get in.

How do others stop their shrimp getting in the external filters if they're using skimmers like this? Or do I need to ditch these skimmers and move to the Eheims?

Cheers

Johnny

When I had my glass inlet with skimmer, I had similar concerns - though I have cherry shrimp (Bloody Mary variant) which are even smaller than Amanos.

I purchased some of this material from eBay: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/20x20cm-...e=STRK:MEBIDX:IT&_trksid=p2057872.m2749.l2648 (It was recommend in another thread on this forum, by Zeus if memory serves)

I cut a small disc out of it, small enough to fit just inside the base of the skimmer head. It still allows the skimmer to work, but prevents any shrimp getting past it into the filter. The downside is that you need to clean the disc almost daily, as it soon gets covered with loose leaves - that does of course increase maintenance requirements, but also prevents those large pieces ending up rotting inside your filter.

In the end though, I gave up on the glass skimmer pipe, as it would either just sink below the surface, to rise up too high and draw loads of air into my filter. I now have the separate Eheim skimmer, and that seems to work well so far, though I have a similar mesh guard on that too, as I've also found shrimp get into it. Getting rid of the glass skimmer also increased my flow rate considerably, so that much have been restricting the flow.

Amano's can be a bit of nightmare though, and can escape the tank entirely. This weekend I was cleaning our tank with the filter off. When I was finished, I went to turn the filter back on, and noticed an Amano had swam up the outlet lily pipe, just past the U-bend at the top, and was frantically trying to swim backwards to get itself out. I had to turn on the filter and blast him out backwards at Mach 2! (He was fine)