[astrosag]

Hey all,

My main tank has Eco-Complete which I hear isn't the most ideal substrate for shrimp - but that can't be helped at this point.

I also want to set up a much smaller tank and add some cherry shrimp I'll be getting next week. Substrate for shrimp is something I can control with this one.

What's the best? Thanks!

 

[ohbaby714]

I'm not an expert but been using Fluval Shrimp Stratum on my tank both 40B and 10g.

Too bad Amazon is in Cali.
http://www.amazon.com/Hagen-12686-F...UL8S/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1314896004&sr=8-2
8.8lb is only $19.35 for me with primes shipping and no taxes.
This is the cheapest i ever seen it, and end up buying 2 bags last week for reserve.

Anyway, very easy to work with a little light but decent at growing plants and my shrimps love rolling the pellets around. Plus they breed like roaches.

 

[GeToChKn]

I used eco-complete for my cherries, tigers and snowballs. My cherries are breeding like mad right now. About 15 babies I can see, 4 more berried, 3 more saddled and probably lots more babies I can't see yet.

 

[piffy]

I use ADA aquasoil amazonia II, which buffers my water pretty nicely. It's a little pricey though. I've heard good things about fluval shrimp stratum, but I've never tried it.

IMO, cherry shrimp will be okay in almost any substrate - shrimps that require specific water conditions is where you might be more concerned about what substrate to use.

 

[mordalphus]

Try to get a soil made for shrimp or aquasoil amazonia. Those are the best.

I use stratum, Mr. Aqua soil and aquasoil, ill be trying out the new up aqua shrimp soil soon too. They all work pretty good so far

 

[dhgyello04]

I use the Fluval Shrimp Stratum in both my 7.9 CRS nano and my 46 bow front OEBT tank. Both tanks are holding a 6.8 PH. The substrate is engineered to keep the 6.8 PH. I say go with the Fluval.

-Don

 

[GeToChKn]

I have the Netlea soil in my crystal tank, keeps it at like 6.2 and my crystals are breeding and finally see babies, but for the cherries and others that don't need a specific pH, I just have eco-complete. I do dose my tank with several Mosara products though too, even the cherry ones, so that may help, no idea.

 

[msnikkistar]

If you can get it, netlea. I drool over the stuff, but I can't get my hands on it

 

[GeToChKn]

If you can get it, netlea. I drool over the stuff, but I can't get my hands on it

My tapwater is 7.6 and fairly hard. I mix 4-1 tap with distilled and top off my crystal tank and it stays at 6.2 with the netlea. It is really amazing stuff. Drops my gH as well and I finally saw crystal babies last night for the time, so they must like what it's doing to the water too. I had them at first in tap water for months, put them in their tank with the netlea soil and its been about 6 weeks since they were in there and babies already, so that pretty much, in the tank, molted, saddled, preggers, berried, born. Soon as they got in the tank with the Netlea, they started getting down to work. I also put in some Eheim Peat Pellets into my filter as well just to help keep it softer as its filtering and get the maximum life out of the soil. Any of the buffering soils will eventually run out and start to raise pH as it runs out, so the softer the water you can add, the less buffering and the longer it will last. Some people say the Fluval shrimp stuff runs out too quick but I think if you do a mix of tap water/distilled water/ro water or pure ro, it will last a lot longer as well. the main thing is to keep a log or excel sheet of your readings once every few weeks so you can see when things start to change.

 

[msnikkistar]

Oh, it has nothing to do with that. I just want the stuff. lol My tap is already soft and I only do top offs with distilled, so not an issue. I just want the dang stuff. Dang Canadians, get all the good stuff.

 

[GeToChKn]

The only thing to watch out for is the netlea soil (and maybe others besides the fluval) is there is added ammonia to the soil to allow you to cycle it without adding anything. I would wait a good month if not two of setting up a tank with it to make sure it was fully cycled and no more spikes and stiring the soil around to make sure all the starter ammonia is cycled through. The plus side is that ammonia is usually converted to ammonium in a low pH environment so its really harmful but still better safe than sorry.

 

[GeToChKn]

Oh, it has nothing to do with that. I just want the stuff. lol My tap is already soft and I only do top offs with distilled, so not an issue. I just want the dang stuff. Dang Canadians, get all the good stuff.

For once!!!!!!!!!! lol.

Everything else is more expensive, or shipping is nuts. Pay $30 shipping on something from the 'bay that cost $20. lol. Shipping on shrimp. I so want some of Franks shrimp from your Canadian site, but $50 shipping for overnight sucks. I know its not his fault, that what our shipping costs, just to make that worth it, I have to get some expensive shrimp and a good quantity, cause again, I don't want to pay $50 shipping for $50 worth of shrimp. lol.

 

[somewhatshocked]

Great. You folks WOULD have to mention Netlea again.

Now I'm going to have to bang my head against the table for a while to forget about how badly I want to get my hands on more of that stuff. It's been better for me than Amazonia when it comes to water param stability here in Louisville.

HINT, HINT to U.S. sellers. Please get on that gravy train ASAP. There are nerds like us who would snatch it up in hordes.

 

[jrwestcoast]

+1 I have been looking for Netlea soil for sometime and can only look hope someone in the U.S. will one day sell it to all of us.:hihi:

 

[GeToChKn]

Opps, sorry I brought it up

lol.

 

[msnikkistar]

Dang Canadians bringing up the goods we want.

Sent from my SGH-i917 using Board Express

 

[oblongshrimp]

Who makes Netlea soil? Where is it originally from?

 

[msnikkistar]

It's from somewhere in Asia. In order to get it here, you would need to get USDA and AGI to approve it. That would mean getting it analyzed. It's a hot mess.

 

[astrosag]

Wow, didn't expect this level of response! Thanks for your input.

I started another thread asking about my water but I may as well add it here since you mention that some of these substrates help control pH.

My test-strip tests (color coded) show that my water is quite hard and ver alkanine.

pH is 8+ and KH and GH are 300 ppm. This may mean that I need to invest in a pH controlling substrate?

 

[HolyAngel]

Yeah it means you won't be able to keep any caridina species, only neon's, unless you use aquasoil or something like it, or switch to RO water and supplements. Ph needs to be around 6-7 and kh=0-1 gh=less than 5. The liquid test kit is easier to compare then the test strips and more accurate as well.