Hello folks
Looking for a bit of advice on my new setup.
I've just bought a 60l cube tank on eBay. It's filtered by a Dennerle nano external, and lit by a BiOrb LED light unit. My plan is to turn it into a shrimp tank holding 2-3 colourful species.
The substrate is inert dark sand, and the decor is a large stack of lava rock. I will be adding live plants once I;ve worked out what can live in the conditions provided, but this is shrimps first, plants second. I won't be adding CO2.
Where I live the water is very hard and alkaline (hence my main tank houses Tang cichlids...) In the past I have kept and bred cherry shrimp successfully in this water but I realise it's not well suited to the more "delicate" species like CRS and Tigers. I don't have space for my own RO unit but we have a Maidenhead Aquatics 2 minutes drive from here who will sell me RO. So, this is the plan:
RO water plus (remineraliser/tap water) to achieve a pH of about 6.6-6.8, kH 3-4, gH 4-5.
Given this, I have a couple of questions -
1) I was initially thinking blue pearl shrimp (first) and then adding CRS later. Alternatively, I could do red or yellow cherry shrimp (first) and then add blue tigers later. Are tigers significantly easier to keep than CRS? Would they be a safer bet. Any problems with either of these combos?
2) Can I add "green" c. babaulti to this setup, or do they need harder water than I'm aiming for?
3) What sort of water change regime would you suggest? I do 30% weekly with my tangs with well matched prepared water. Should I aim for similar with the shrimps, or is stable water/smaller changes the way to go?
Any advice appreciated as always!
Pic of tank as it currently stands:
Looking for a bit of advice on my new setup.
I've just bought a 60l cube tank on eBay. It's filtered by a Dennerle nano external, and lit by a BiOrb LED light unit. My plan is to turn it into a shrimp tank holding 2-3 colourful species.
The substrate is inert dark sand, and the decor is a large stack of lava rock. I will be adding live plants once I;ve worked out what can live in the conditions provided, but this is shrimps first, plants second. I won't be adding CO2.
Where I live the water is very hard and alkaline (hence my main tank houses Tang cichlids...) In the past I have kept and bred cherry shrimp successfully in this water but I realise it's not well suited to the more "delicate" species like CRS and Tigers. I don't have space for my own RO unit but we have a Maidenhead Aquatics 2 minutes drive from here who will sell me RO. So, this is the plan:
RO water plus (remineraliser/tap water) to achieve a pH of about 6.6-6.8, kH 3-4, gH 4-5.
Given this, I have a couple of questions -
1) I was initially thinking blue pearl shrimp (first) and then adding CRS later. Alternatively, I could do red or yellow cherry shrimp (first) and then add blue tigers later. Are tigers significantly easier to keep than CRS? Would they be a safer bet. Any problems with either of these combos?
2) Can I add "green" c. babaulti to this setup, or do they need harder water than I'm aiming for?
3) What sort of water change regime would you suggest? I do 30% weekly with my tangs with well matched prepared water. Should I aim for similar with the shrimps, or is stable water/smaller changes the way to go?
Any advice appreciated as always!
Pic of tank as it currently stands:
