Pregnant Shrimp In Uncycled Tank Help

[kbod]

explanation , today (sunday) called at pet shop to get some plants , while i was there they had a problem with tanks and theyd found 2 very heavily pregnant shrimp in a tank that needed clearing emergency and didnt have anywhere else to put them,they offered them to me free as shop was closing.

but my quarentine tanks only been running a week,the guy said it would be ok and no loss if they didnt make it ...i dont see it like that i think any loss is a shame,got the feelin he was gonna dump them if i didt have them ,so of course i did,

i cant put them in my 2 small tanks as poss tb, my 200 litre is in a fishless cycle only started doing few days,

all i have is this small quarentine tank thats been running for a week .... or lots of empty tanks and equipment .. what do i do

i will be setting up a shrimp tank but its not even started yet ..

whats best chance for the adults as well as poss babies ?, how, when ,where will they lay eggs ? if eggs survive how do they hatch,? what do they feed on ?

abit out my depth plz help as want to make good of a bad situation .

 

[WILDER]

I would post in tropical discussion get more help over there.
Good Luck.

 

[Tolak]

I would pull some media from the tanks that are running, and add it to the filter of the shrimp tank, effectively cloning a tank. Due to biological exclusion the much larger colony of nitrifying bacteria on the filter media will prevent the bacteria making the fish ill from being transferred. They are basically choked out, and won't survive in the media.

 

[Gilli]

Dont panick! They will survive in an uncycled tank. I had to take my 3 x amanno shrimp out to treat my main tank in an emergency and put them in an uncycled tank.

You will need to do a 75% water change every day though for 4- 6 weeks until your filter is fully seeded. (check water stats on a regular basis). This is very important as shrimp are very sensitive to ammonia and nitrites. Do as Tolak says and take some sponge from your cycled filters and put it into the quarrantine filter. Also take some gravel from your cyled tanks to speed up the cycling and put plenty of plants in which will help keep nitrates down and will keep the shrimp happy as they like to hide in them and feed off the algae that grows on them.

Feed with shrimp or crab pellets, algae wafers, flake and frozen live foods. They need a varied diet to be able to grow their shells and be able to shed them which if they cant do so will kill them.

Cant help you with your questions on hatchlings etc as mine are all female!

Hope this helps and good luck!

 

[kbod]

thanks im doing water changes they seem fine at present, i have got algae tabs so fed them
but i cant use filter media from other tanks as poss tb in them noticed some eggs getting sucked into flter.dont think theyre gonna do any good now .

 

[Gilli]

Ok - just stick with the water changes then and all should be well.