[andbigdaddy2]

Hey I bought 10 cherry’s from Tom he's on here and EBay great guy buy from him anyway its been about a week and a half and the shrimp haven’t eaten the small amounts of food I put in every day usually its a snail that gets it. I have a large piece of drift wood in the tank that used to be in another tank that had fish in it I see them picking at the drift wood constantly should I be concerned or will they take food once they are done eating off the drift wood.
I have tried Wardley Algae Discs, Nutrafin livebearer food and Tetra color Granules with cyclopeeze all with no effect.

 

[conduct]

I have had mine now about 5 days and the snails beat them to the food also. It is like they don't care. Always picking at the driftwood.

 

[epicfish]

Try some boiled spinach. Put it under some rocks or substrate to keep it down...cherries will eat when they're hungry.

 

[crazie.eddie]

How big is the tank? It maybe the tank is big that the shrimp hasn't found the food yet. With that few of a shrimp, I would break down the food in smaller pieces and spread it throughout the tank.

 

[Burks]

They might be full from eating everything else in the tank. Mine are always picking at moss and driftwood.

 

[Cydric]

I have tried Wardley Algae Discs

Just a heads up, Wardley uses Copper in all it's fish products which we all know is poisonous to shrimp. I'd go with Hikari Algae Pellets, they're normally right beside the Wardley algae pellets in Wal-marts. They're the more expensive kind and in the smaller bag.

Just a word of caution.

Edit: Once the new shrimp are done cleaning your moss, plants, driftwood, and substrate they'll go for the algae pellets and/or fish flakes. Mine didn't go for the food I gave them for a long time until they finally exhausted the microorganisms/algae on my driftwood and so on.

 

[mr.sandman]

Or you can just wave the food right in their face thats what I did and they just jump at it.

 

[bulrush]

Just a heads up, Wardley uses Copper in all it's fish products which we all know is poisonous to shrimp.

Does it use elemental copper, or copper sulfate? I have used food with copper sulfate for 18+ months with no problems with my RCS. Copper sulfate is simply an antibacterial. Elemental copper (like from a US penny or a copper pipe) is what is bad for shrimp. Copper sulfate seems to be ok.

 

[Cydric]

Does it use elemental copper, or copper sulfate? I have used food with copper sulfate for 18+ months with no problems with my RCS. Copper sulfate is simply an antibacterial. Elemental copper (like from a US penny or a copper pipe) is what is bad for shrimp. Copper sulfate seems to be ok.

It's copper sulfate and people have had mixed outcomes from using it. I don't think it'll do any harm to shrimp as long as it's not the shrimp's main diet. I use Hikari brand just to be on the safe side. I'm not chancing anything when it comes to my CRS.

 

[A Hill]

Does it use elemental copper, or copper sulfate? I have used food with copper sulfate for 18+ months with no problems with my RCS. Copper sulfate is simply an antibacterial. Elemental copper (like from a US penny or a copper pipe) is what is bad for shrimp. Copper sulfate seems to be ok.

It says copper sulfate I believe, I would have to check my bag. I bought a large bag back last January when I got a pleco who was hungry.... But then I realized it had copper...

Don't take chances when you don't have to. If you can avoid copper anything wouldn't you?

All it takes is one small mistake and you can wipe out your whole colony!

-Andrew

 

[RoyalFizbin]

I used the wardley stuff for over a year and everything was ok and thriving until recently. I had a massive die off of cherry shrimp, and had no shrimp with eggs for a month or more. There was what i would estimate to be about 500 shrimp and then they just started dying several each day, I would say I have about half of that now. The dying didn't stop till i switched food to something without the copper sulfate. Took a month for the dying to stabilize after switching food.

I think the copper sulfate builds up in the shrimp over time till it reaches a toxic level and then they die.