[FewestKitten896]

I usually come home from lunch and enjoy a quick look at my tank and count my inhabitants to make sure they were all there. I had 5 CPD's at midnight last night and came home from lunch to find a preggo ghost shrimp enjoying a nice CPD burger. I didn't have time to check my water params but I usually do my water changes either tonight or tomorrow with 30%-40% PWC.

I can't figure out what might have happened. I keep my tank at 75 degrees and feed a mixture of NLS Small Fish (5 Days/Week), some Omega Flake (5 Days/Week-just sprinkle a little bit crushed up with the NLS) and Frozen Baby Brine (1 Day/Week). I checked my params last week and all my params were fine.

My inhabitants include 5 White Clouds, now 4 (CPD), and 3 ghost shrimp (two male and 1 female).

 

[Art by Stef*]

I never trust a ghost shrimp. Especially a hungry pregger.
I seen them yank young guppies right out of the air...er...water.

Still check all other possibilities though.

-Stef*

 

[garfieldnfish]

Could be the CPD died and the shrimp just found it. Would be my guess. CPDs don't live all that long. Mine are breeding and the colony is always a nice size but sometimes one dies. This could just be old age. If the others are acting normal I would not stress out too much. 30 - 40% water change seems a lot to me. How large is your tank? You do not have a big bio load by any means.

 

[FewestKitten896]

Could be the CPD died and the shrimp just found it. Would be my guess. CPDs don't live all that long. Mine are breeding and the colony is always a nice size but sometimes one dies. This could just be old age. If the others are acting normal I would not stress out too much. 30 - 40% water change seems a lot to me. How large is your tank? You do not have a big bio load by any means.

Yeah I am guessing this one just up and died and the shrimp found it to be an easy snack. My tank is only a 10 gallon but mostly likely only an 8 gallon with dirt and gravel substrate. I was only doing 1 gallon water changes and then increased to 2-3 gallon changes and noticed a lot better growth with my plants. My water does have a trace of ammonia out of the faucet but did a test on the tank water yesterday and parameters are fine. 0 ammonia, 0 nitrites, <10ppm of nitrates. pH always stays in the high 7's to low 8's.

My wife thinks I need some more colorful fish so I am going to add some guppy's to the tank for her and will eventually get a larger tank in the next few months.

 

[water-kitties]

Mine spar on occasion, usually its harmless. Once though, I found one with an infection near its eye from an injury and it died very shortly after by the time I saw it. Just another possibility depending on your school.

 

[lamiskool]

nothing really to do with this case but man I have one lucky CPD, all my tanks have lids on them but has a small opening in the back for the filter/heater and while I was looking at one of my tanks thats next to my CPD tank I see one CPD in it! This means it had somehow jumped out of the small opening and luckly jumped right into the tank next to it lol I have found two CPD who have jumped and dried up and died so this is one lucky CPD, moved him back to his proper tank yesterday

 

[garfieldnfish]

Did you cover the hole? I found that my shrimp like to escape too. I covered all openings with craft canvas taped over the holes. No more escaping from my shrimp tanks.

 

[lamiskool]

Did you cover the hole? I found that my shrimp like to escape too. I covered all openings with craft canvas taped over the holes. No more escaping from my shrimp tanks.

cant really cover it as I need the opening to put in my filter/heater

 

[FewestKitten896]

Well I ended up going with 5 neon tetras. This should fill my capacity until I get a larger tank. I just bought a house today also so I can finally upgrade my little 10 gallon to a larger tank and will keep the 10 gallon as my CPD only tank.

 

[FewestKitten896]

Another one just died over the night. I have came to the conclusion that I am going to have to try another food. I only have 3 left and one of them seems quite plump but the others seems extremely skinny. I have tried feeding flake food, NLS Small Pellets, baby brine shrimp and only the larger one seems to take any of it. Yes I have a lot of fish competing for food but it seems like they go next to it and ignore it. Is there any other ideas that I can use. I was thinking about frozen microworms or fronzen daphnia?

 

[Veritas]

i've had some bad luck with CPDs getting really skinny and dying lately as well. One day they seem fine, then they get really skinny and die shortly after.

 

[garfieldnfish]

Do you have access to live grindal worms or scuds? Mine go crazy over that. If you lived closer I could give you one of my cultures. Frozen daphnia is ok too. But mine have no problems with flakes or small pellet food either. They really eat everything. I wonder if your PH might be a little high for them as well. Mine are in 7.0 and some even in a black water tank. Also did you ever deworm them? They might have internal parasites if they were wild caught. Prazipro is a good de-wormer for fish.

 

[FewestKitten896]

Do you have access to live grindal worms or scuds? Mine go crazy over that. If you lived closer I could give you one of my cultures. Frozen daphnia is ok too. But mine have no problems with flakes or small pellet food either. They really eat everything. I wonder if your PH might be a little high for them as well. Mine are in 7.0 and some even in a black water tank. Also did you ever deworm them? They might have internal parasites if they were wild caught. Prazipro is a good de-wormer for fish.

I don't believe I do but I haven't gone around to the LFS to ask them. I do have a fairly higher PH around 8 and relatively hard water. Seems like a lot of Kansas water is relatively hard and high pH due to all the limestone around. I have thought about ordering a culture but I think my wife would freak out. When I had a lizard she freaked about my cricket breeding adventure. I never dewormed them and am unsure if they were wild caught or tank bred. I might give that frozen daphnia a try tonight and see if that sparks some sort of appetite.