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CRS Bowl

1K views 8 replies 3 participants last post by  Betta Maniac 
#1 ·
My name is Dallas and I have MTS.

I bought my first tank (since I was a kid) in the start of September. I know have 2 and want to start a shrimp bowl to sit on my desk.

I was reading a "how to" online article about the process and something didn't seem right to me so thought I would ask here.

Basically the author said to go with MGOCPM and a PFS cap which seems ok. Then plant it with whatever plants you wanted.

Right after that it said to add the shrimp. This doesn't seem right to me though. I am guessing I need to wait and allow the bowl to cycle?

From my experience with the dirt tank I am cycling now, the ammonia etc would be pretty high to start with. Would this not just kill the shrimp?

Thanks!
 
#3 ·
yes you're going to want to cycle the bowl if you have the time. in the unlikely event that you are out of time and have no place to put shrimp into but the bowl, then just start out with massive amount of fast growing plants and give it plenty of light. you will hopefully soft-cycle the bowl (or at least avoid the harmful effects of a cycle as the plants use up the harmful compounds)...but this is certainly not guaranteed.

i think only lower grade CRS are suitable, and that's only if you can keep the temperature stable between winter and summer (summer will be the biggest issue).

I have kept CRS in my bowl before.
 
#7 ·
yes, what i would recommend is to setup the bowl with plants (maybe do a dry start for a couple of months) and run the bowl for as long as it takes to get lush healthy growth before adding the shrimp. you should run the bowl on roughly 8 hours of daylight for a fully planted bowl, and maybe do weekly water changes of about 30-50% just to get into the rhythm of taking care of it. then after a month or more try out a few shrimp, and test parameters with them in there. if anything happens, quickly do water changes to soften the effects of a possible cycle.

this is all assuming you are making a heaterless and filterless bowl for the shrimp. the plants, lighting and water quality will be keys here.
 
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