[doinkmobb]

I have a lot of shelf space, I have a tank that fits perfectly and I don't want my cats to spend all day trying to murder a brightly colored fluttery betta so...a shrimp tank seems like a good idea.

Aquarium - ADA Mini S - 3.5 gallons
Lighting - Finnex Stingray 12" (with pet proof screen blocking some light)
Filter - Finnex PX-360
Substrate - pool filter sand
Plants - Anubias, subwassertang, flame moss
Temp - 76F
TDS- shooting to keep it under 200
Shrimp - Sakura culls (coming soon!)





First of all, I want to say that Purigen is amazing stuff. Sitting at my desk, it looks like there's no water in my tank. Secondly, this PX-360 filter is very nice for the price (I paid $36 recently). With all the media in place, it holds about 1.4L of water. I figure with all the stuff in the tank, the actual water volume is probably about 11L, maybe less. That's a good amount of extra water flowing through the system. The media chambers are generously sized and it came with a ton of plumbing parts. I set up a spray bar vertically in the back corner, and plumbed an airline into the bottom-most spray hole up to some additional pieces to promote some surface agitation. Without this, the surface was absolutely still and getting grimy.

The Anubias sprigs are all I have left from a glorious clump that I had in my Amazon biotope-ish setup; they didn't survive my recent move from Tampa so well. I plan on dosing macros 1x week and micros 2x month. 500mL water changes 2x week. The water in Greenville is awesome out of the tap - 25ppm, 2-3 GH and 2-3 KH. So if I want to try my hand with some more advanced shrimp later on, I have excellent water to start with. As of right now, there's a lot of copepods chilling on the glass, so I guess the parameters are right.

The barricade of books around the tank? Yeah, cats. The slightest bit of room and they're up there drinking delicious fishy (or shrimpy) water. Idiots.

 

[noelanr]

Sounds like its gonna be an exciting tank, looking forward to seeing more

Sent from my ALCATEL ONETOUCH 6050A using Tapatalk

 

[doinkmobb]

Shrimps came in today, I got a dozen culls from a Sakura colony (just call them RCS then?). These guys are active, more active than I thought they would be. I figured they'd just be slowly lumbering around the tank, but they seem really hyper. I assume the biggest one in the middle of the moss is a female?

I could use a macro lens...

 

[doinkmobb]

There's been a molting and I think a mating already. Interesting.

 

[doinkmobb]

Shrimp are very inactive/hiding today. I tested the water:
ph - 7.2
Am - 0
NO2 - 0
NO3 - 0

I changed out 1L just to be safe. Strangely enough, the shrimp that are out look more colorful and I don't see any bodies laying anywhere. And the large female is berried. That was quick.

I also dropped in a NLS 1mm cichlid pellet to see if I could entice them to come out, but no one's interested.

 

[touch of sky]

They are most likely adjusting to the new tank. I recently set up a new shrimp tank, and I had the same thing happen. The first day they were put in the tank they were quite active, then for the next few days, they hid more. Now they are out and about. I think they just had to get used to their new surroundings.

 

[doinkmobb]

Still not a whole lot of activity, but the ones that I do see all look colorful and healthy. They ignore any pellets I drop in the tank, so I guess they're getting enough just from scrounging around. A dozen shrimp in a 3.5 gal tank doesn't seem like enough, maybe I'll pick up another 5-10.

 

[doinkmobb]

Shrimp are still kicking along. I'm not really sure how many adults I have, but there are 4-5 shrimplets crawling around. Neat. I feel like I should dump in 15-20 more adults though, I'd like to see some more crustacean activity going on.

I'm doing minimal maintenance: one week, I do a top off, the next week, I do a water change. I keep the water between 170-200 TDS. I drop in some NLS algae pellets 3x a week and very occasionally scrub algae off the front glass. No ferts, no filter maintenance, no trimming. I will have to do something about the java moss clump in the right front corner though, it's getting a little unruly.

 

[Cmeister]

I like this! Simple, looks great, easy! How do you go about doing water changes in a tank that small?

 

[doinkmobb]

I like this! Simple, looks great, easy! How do you go about doing water changes in a tank that small?

Just a hose and drain into a bucket. I was being precise about taking out 1L during water changes, but now I just eyeball it. I keep a small container of conditioned water on hand for top offs and changes.

I'm really liking that Finnex PX-360 filter. I was using an AZOO Mignon filter on this tank when I had in set up at work, but it didn't really do much filtration wise. I don't see any reason to crack open the Finnex and clean it any time soon.

 

[Cmeister]

What do you do to keep shrimpies from being sucked in? I do the same thing to change water in my main tank, I use the filter to drain the water out.

 

[doinkmobb]

I guess I would call it careful hose placement. I don't have that many shrimp, I keep the hose near the surface and I'm only draining for 10 seconds max.

 

[Betta132]

Tank looks great! Very simple, and a great shrimpy house.
Try a couple of Thai micro crabs if you can get them. They might hide a lot, but in a tank with no scary critters or predators, you'd have a decent chance at seeing them.