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I'll buck the trend here and say I would have thought your general tank clearout is more likely to have solved things from a general health point of view. Cherries are incredibly hardy, and I've got them in tanks with TDS of 550, another small tank at 350, and they're happy as anything, and...

I do dose ferts, so I guess that could be it. Never done my tap tds, I'll measure it sometime. Substrate is fluval stratum. Looks like the general consensus is the rescape is to blame. Makes me feel reassured and guilty at the same time. Thanks guys.

Yea, rinsed it under a fast running tap, then dumped it into a Prime'd bowl of water througout the planting process just to get those last pesky bits of chlorine! Half of me really thinks I'm fretting for no reason (after all, there must be 70+ shrimp in my Rio 180), but on the other hand I...

A couple of hours, since I kept about half of the old tank water (I avoid changing any more of a tank in one go than I have to). Very little sediment released, but in fairness I haven't done an ammonia test. Tank did have fish in it up until the rescape, so I would have thought they was a good...

Ah well, I'll have to live with the tannins and let the Purigen take care of them. Time for a mail order to be on the safe side I reckon! Even if it's not required, it can't do any harm :).

Thanks to both for the replies. - Don't know on the gH - since the other tanks have always been fine, I've never tested it. All I know is that it's barely 1 degree on the water report. Shrimp in other tanks all molt fine though, never had any deaths partway through a molt. - I've got some...

Cheers, might get some Beta G or similar.

I'm looking to use my Ebi tank to start a Sakura colony, with the idea being that any excess numbers will be moved into my other tanks to improve the RCS bloodlines in there. I got 4 about 6 weeks or so ago, 2 male and 2 female (I think, I'm no guru!). I lost a male about 2 weeks in, but all...

Red rams are good cleanup crew, but personally I avoid them like the plague because they breed so quickly! Malaysian Trumpet Snails are good for turning the substrate over, plant safe, and slow breeding. Got a whole load in my Trigon.

I've had a few MTS knocking around in my tank for a fair few months, nice to have some hitchhikers that are welcome for a change. Having not seen them for months, they're back in force tonight and a couple are over an inch in length. Is there anything in particular that brings them out, or have...

Where do you get your dried leaves from please basil? Always after more varied good foods for my shrimp and fish.

"Best value" really depends on what you want from it. If you're going for an invert substrate and using rocks or additives for any parameters for example, then molar clay is the best. If you want an all in one solution, then Dane has flagged a couple of options. More details required :).

Not just wow on the shrimp, great pictures too!

Rehousing them won't be a problem Tim. From careful observation I reckon the emotional state of amano shrimp is perpetually "cheeky"!

I didn't think they ate filamentous diatoms though?

Pretty sure the hair algae I've been plagued with is actually filamentous diatoms (appears there is a strong link with new Fluval stratum substrate and this). As a result, I was going to employ the ever faithful Amano shrimp. Given it's only a 30l tank, I reckon the most I can reasonably put in...

Will do this evening, presuming they aren't being as elusive by then!

Ok, so most of my amano shrimp are usually an off-white colour, with maybe a hint of an orangey/beige tinge around places. There's one though that really is quite orange I've noticed, and I was wondering whether this was just a colour variation, or whether it was a sign of anything? Tank is...

Both striata are a good addition to control snails. They're shy, but you'll see the evidence of their work even if you don't see them!

Interesting, might give those a go then, thanks!

What's the purpose of banana leaves basil? I know catappa leaves for tannins, but haven't encountered people using banana leaves before. Cheers!

I really haven't got my amanos sussed in my main tank. Admittedly I'm making zero effort to breed them, but the females seem to be permanently berried - I never see them lose the eggs or anything, it seems to be a fixed stated, same in both my tanks actually!

I seem to have a growing population of Malaysian trumpet snails in my trigon, so I'm cutting back on food as they can be a sign of over feeding. Also have mini ramshorns which are a visual pest but don't harm the plants. Used to have red ramshorns but I systematically removed those as they bred...

Prevention is the best way. There are two main options - either get a stainless steel mesh guard for your filter, or use some "tight" material.

You'll need to do a water change with some water of lower TDS, but sufficient mineral content to avoid affecting your other parameters. It'll be tricky, but achievable.

Evening all! I've got a 23l tank full of Red Cherry shrimp (plus some snails that I'm slowly eradicating), and they seem to be doing really well at the moment, zero deaths, plenty of moulting, generally happy shrimp! One thing that I was hoping to improve on though is their colouring -...

I've read that ramshorn snails are amphibious. Is this true, and if so, can I therefore relocate my excess from my tank to the garden without harming the fellas? I really want rid of them but would rather not kill them!

Off topic, but the colour of that shrimp looks fantastic!

Just found out my GH test kit is in fact completely shot, so I've no idea now where I stand!!!! I'll get a fresh one tomorrow and see what it says. Highly irritated now :(. EDIT: So having lost all faith in my test kit, I have returned to what I originally went off when setting up my tanks...

Thanks for all the help guys. Doing a slot dose over the course of the evening to raise the tank up to GH and KH 4 with a MgSO4 solution and bicarb of soda. I'll look into getting some Seachem Equilibrium as a longer term fix, although I want to get something with a calcium element really so...

I might introduce one assassin snail and see if that establishes an equilibrium, thanks!

Thanks, I'll drop by the chemist on the way home and get some epsom salts. I was surprised at my TDS too, but presumed that might be a result of dosing ferts? How will plants assist with nitrite? I thought they only lowered nitrate, and it was the bacteria which converted nitrite to nitrate...

Cheers. I'm in a soft water area, tap water doesn't register on hardness teat kits at all either. I'll give the tank a dose of Melafix and see if that helps. Going to read up on the searches vffer products at lunch and get an urgent order in!

Thanks for the all the replies. How the heck do I get my GH and KH up then? There seem to be a bewildering array of buffers on the market! Also, any "household" recommendations that aren't Seachem would be great, so I can act immediately on the tanks. Cheers!

Also, why have they been fine for so long?i've seen them moult at times too. I'm not arguing, and will definitely buffer the tanks up, I'm just confused as to why this has suddenly kicked in now, and why only in the one tank?

Nope, I did measure, it's below what I can measure. All the other tanks are fine, so is this still the likely cause?should I be buffering all my tanks then?

It's a Nutrafin one.

Ok, just came home to find another couple of dead shrimp in my Fluval Edge, so done every possible chemistry test I can do to try and assist in this, if anyone can shed any light on these then I'd be grateful! I've included my two other mature tanks for reference. One is a 190l Trigon which has...

25% of 23l, poured straight in. Substrate is aquatic soil capped with gravel. Cheers Whitey!

25%

I have a horrible feeling that I've made an error that's killed a load of my shrimp :(. I did a water change at the weekend, and rather than "shock" them with cold water from the tap (with Prime), I put in a bit of hot to bring the temperature up. Today I came home to find some of my shrimp...

Ok, so I got some red ramshorns for my Fluval Edge tank since I thought they'd be a good invert solution to algae control... I may have caused myself a problem here. My 23l tank is now teeming with red ramshorns, (also some speckled/spotted ramshorns?!) and there are "egg patches" absolutely...

Rather than starting another thread, I've just notice this fella in my tank - any suggestions? https://dl.dropbox.com/u/2793861/IMAG0074.jpg To my untrained eye they look like MTS? Also, they seem to mooch along the gravel, digging into the first few millimetres fairly often so just the point...

I'm hoping some sort of natural equilibrium will be reached with my Botia's, but we'll see.

Always good to hear that they aren't trouble, since I seem to be having q bit of a population explosion!If they get out of hand then there might be some going free on the forums soon :p.

I'll get a picture up later, but in the meantime, here's a description: Small (at present?), 1-3mm diameter shell Shell is a circular coil, flat (i.e. like a disc). Shell is at right angles to the snail (like a set of helicopter rotors). I've had these appear in the last couple of days in my...

A couple of my red ramshorns seem to have shells which are slowly turning white - the others are absolutely fine. A bit of research has led me to the conclusion that this might be calcium deficiency, so my questions are: 1) Could this be calcium deficiency given that only some of the snails are...

As per title really, I'm after some cleanup crew for my cherry shrimp tank, but it's too small for Oto's as a permanent home - any suggestions if ramshorns won't do it?

4 Amanos installed, thanks for the advice. They're big buggers aren't they?! Well, compared to Cherries!

I'm afraid on this occasion I'm going to have to ignore the mighty Amano's suggestion!

Cheers. I'll add 4 to start with purely to limit numbers in case my Botia Striata decide they're lunch (I've read conflicting reports online with some people have no problems, and others finding they get eaten). If there's no problem then I'll get another 6 in a week or so. Thanks!

I'm going to get some Amano shrimp to assist in dealing with my hair algae tank (which happens to have some plants and fish in there too....). It's a Trigon 190, moderately planted (planting to increase to heavy in the future). I'm just wondering what number of Amano shrimp would a) be...

Shrimp seem happy :). Damn good at hiding! I can't tell if they're eaten the debris in the tank or not, but they definitely seem to have an urge to collect it into a tidy pile!

Well I'm getting some algae wafers to start with, just did a 75% water change on the tank and a quick gravel clean in anticipation! Also made sure that the filter media is covering all intakes, don't really want shrimp paste!

Ok, so I've done my reading, and tomorrow I'll be getting 6 (hopefully 3M/3F) cherry red shrimp from my LFS, along with some algae wafers. So this post is partly "yey I'm excited" (as sad as that sounds), and partly "I've done my research, but any particular nuggets of info you wish to impart to...

I fancy giving some shrimp a go, and dropped into my LFS today but they only had glass and fire red (£6!), so I was wondering what I should expect to pay for RCS in a shop? I'd buy off the forum but if I miss the delivery I wouldn't forgive myself for causing animals suffering (yes, even...