Copper problems?

1049 Views 11 Replies 6 Participants Last post by Talnesa, May 7, 2020

Talnesa

Discussion Starter · #1 · May 4, 2020

Hoping to get some advice from those knowledgeable here. Haven’t had much success yet at the shrimp-keeping game. I’ve had a cycled 10 gallon, planted tank for about six months. Cherries and carbon rilis only, along with a somewhat largish population of ramshorn snails and two small apple snails. The snails are doing fine, but the shrimp have died off at a rate of a couple per week. I’ve restocked twice from two different breeders with the same result.

Death seem to occur a few days after a water change, which I do weekly (10%). All of my parameters are fine in terms of ammonia, nitrate and nitrite. Ph of 7.6, Kh of 5 & Gh of about 7 (maybe 8). I use Prime treated tap water for the changes. I did look up our water report & copper is at 1.3ppm. Could that be causing it? Dead shrimp appear fine. I’ve noticed some darkening of the cherries shells while alive but nothing else.

Any help would be appreciated!

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SardinePatheNews

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Joined Nov 12, 2019

81 Posts

#8 · May 5, 2020

if it was poisoning i would expect them all to go to the great scampi basket in the sky within a week or two rather than a steady attrition rate your seeing but to reach copper my water would have to seep through the coral lining of 40 years of hard water scaling so i've zero practical experience (though i go through kettles and immersion heaters like you go through shrimp so its not all great... )

Are they managing successful molts at all ?

What diet are they getting ? I've had an excessive attrition when mine have had high protein food as more than a rare treat (they do love a bit smoked back bacon to break up the steamed salad routine

)