Cherry red shrimp and discus?

[konceppt]

Just wondered;

A) Would cherry red shrimp do a good job of keeping the tank cleaner?
as i am hoovering the tank everyday and seem to be fighting a losing battle.Its a bare bottom tank and however many water changes i do or how much i vacuum the tank,There seems to be a lot of floating particles in the water and on the glass.

B) If i bought some Cherry Red shrimp,would the discus eat them?

C) If shrimp are a bad idea,Would a plec work?

Thanks
Ben

[retiredsailor]

as a general rule if they can fit in the discus' mouth, they will get eaten. plus the shrimp will need someplace to hide, maybe fake plants or potted real plants?

[Lenin]

Mine hunted the shrimps around a heavily planted tank, it will be very expensive snacks

[TURQ64]

And besides, my shrimps seem pretty fragile; how would you go about quarantine??..They don't like meds, and could bring a pathogen or two to your fish,same as plants...I don't think they'd care much for a PP dip!

[Scott293]

I wondered the same thing about cherry red shrimp. We have a breeder here locally who tells me that he is afraid of selling me parasites. I saw one CRS breeder in Florida who tells about breeding them by the thousands in 5 gallons buckets with plants and an air stone. I thought maybe they would be a good multiplying live food source for my discus. But from what I have seen, to thrive they like a much cooler water temp than discus, around 74-78 degrees and they like hard water. ...Scott

[konceppt]

so its a no then? lol

[LizStreithorst]

It's a no, I'm afraid, although if you could afford them they'd make a great live food ;)

It's a shame that you can't get the Magnum Hot filters in the UK. I use them with on all my tanks. They keep the water crystal clear.

[nc0gnet0]

Just to correct a few misconceptions.

They do fine at discus temps (at least the lower end)
They do fine in softer water
Not sure if they carry parasites are not, but I have a feeling that most that post they do is based on an assumption and not actual fact. I can say, I don't think they are anymore likely to carry parasites than say a pleco, or some rummynose tetras. Probably much less likely.

Will they get eaten? Probably.....at least the younger ones. But, I do have a breeding colony in one of my discus community tanks and they do manage to keep up with the predatation. Trouble is, at LFS prices, estabishing a colony could get extremly expensive. If you had another tank dedicated to breeding CRS, then it might be feasable.

Rick

[TURQ64]

O.k., to sidetrack a little..In the 'shrimp world'. I believe 'CRS' stands for 'Crystal Red Shrimp', a type of bee shrimp, not applicable to 'red cherry shrimp', but so much for all the abbreviations...Gary

[Skip]

To answer your question.. IHMO


Just wondered;

A) Would cherry red shrimp do a good job of keeping the tank cleaner?
as i am hoovering the tank everyday and seem to be fighting a losing battle.Its a bare bottom tank and however many water changes i do or how much i vacuum the tank,There seems to be a lot of floating particles in the water and on the glass.

what filtration to you have? is is the floating particles that you don't like? how often do you water change and how much?


B) If i bought some Cherry Red shrimp,would the discus eat them?
probably.. those are very tiny expensive shrimp.. if you want shrimp. .get ghost shrimp.. they are very cheap.. probably get 20 of them for the price of a CRS


C) If shrimp are a bad idea,Would a plec work?
i would get corys before a pleco... but some plecos will eat the slime off discus.. if you really want one of them.. get bristle nose pleco.. they are very highly regraded to live with discus..

[Scott293]

Just to correct a few misconceptions.

They do fine at discus temps (at least the lower end)
They do fine in softer water
Not sure if they carry parasites are not, but I have a feeling that most that post they do is based on an assumption and not actual fact. I can say, I don't think they are anymore likely to carry parasites than say a pleco, or some rummynose tetras. Probably much less likely.

Will they get eaten? Probably.....at least the younger ones. But, I do have a breeding colony in one of my discus community tanks and they do manage to keep up with the predatation. Trouble is, at LFS prices, estabishing a colony could get extremly expensive. If you had another tank dedicated to breeding CRS, then it might be feasable.

Rick

OK Rick I got my info from shrimp breeders who post information on the internet such as this one and many more who all state pretty much the same thing as what I stated. http://www.plantedtank.net/articles/Cherry-Shrimp-Breeding-and-Care/23/. So what do you consider as fact vs assumption? ...Scott

[Scott293]

I just went to a local fish auction 3 weeks ago and the shrimp guy did very well averaging over $1 each for his, what he called, "cherry red shrimp". He also sold "Christal Red Shrimp" that had much more color to them, which sold for over $2 each, in bags of a dozen. I had a long conversation with him. He said he raises thousands of them easily at very little cost. I have zero experience with shrimp Ben. I was as curious as you. What turned me off is when the shrimp guy, who said he knows Discus, told me he would be afraid of selling me parasites. From what Rick is saying, I think I am going to look into this more. I have a bushy nose pleco with my discus who has been no problem at all.

[nc0gnet0]

Scott,

I am not sure of the question you are asking? The link you posted says nothing of them carrying parasites, although while I am sure this is possible, no more so than another live species you may place into you discus tank (ie pleco, cory, tetra, live blackworms, etc). It does list what is considered "optimal" conditions for breeding, but that is not an absolute. Personally, if I were, and when I do, place the cherry shrimp in the tank with discus, I am more worried about the water they are in carrying the "nasties" then the shrimp themselves. For this reason I give them a good rinse in a coffee filter strainer first.

I have to do nothing other than look over my shoulder to say conclusivly that they can and do thrive at a tank temp of 83 degrees, with a ph of 7.8-8.0 and a tds of 200. They are very sensitive to poor water quality, and can be a sort of poor mans canary in the coal mine to let you now something is amiss.

[farebox]

Before I added my discus to my planted tank, there a nice colony of cherry red shrimp. Couple of weeks later, couldn't see any....
farebox

[nc0gnet0]

Scott,

I would like to add, that the cherry shrimp I add to my discus tanks are 3-4 generations deep, bred in my own non-discus tank. I would not advise adding them to your tank directly from any outside source. They can get to places that pleco's and cory's can't, and do a good job at keeping the plants clean, be they fake or artificial. They can and will get eaten by the discus, but I consider this population control as they breed like cockroaches.


O.k., to sidetrack a little..In the 'shrimp world'. I believe 'CRS' stands for 'Crystal Red Shrimp',

Your probably right Turq, what can I say I am just a lazy typist ;)

[Scott293]

Rick, No, none of them say anything about parasites. But when a local breeder of shrimp tells me he knows discus and doesn't want to sell me any because he is afraid of selling me parasites, that carries a big message for me. ...Scott

[DerekFF]

i dont know many LFS who REALLY know discus lol. The correct abbreviation for them is Red Cherry Shrimp or RCS. CRS is crystal red shrimp and is a totally different shrimp. Just to clarify here. Im sure as already stated they "could" carry diseases but so can anything else i guess. They should be cheaper than $1. You can get them on aquabid for $.50 with free shipping or heck ill sell you some of mine for $.50 each and shipping is like $3. These guys make babies like rabbits and do fine in my tank too. I keep it at 82f for the discus and they do dissapear since i dont give a lot of hiding spots, but my 10g shrimp tank has at least 100 adults and probably the same amount of babies. You could start you own little colony for about $15 and they do fine with discus parameters

[konceppt]

A friend of mine breeds them so price isnt really an issue but i dont want to bring in any disease.I used to feed my firemouths river shrimp,They are cheap here.
Would they do the same cleaning job as cherry reds?

To be honest the particles in the water are only there when i am doing a water change because of the disturbance but when it all settles,It settles on the glass and the bogwood.I want it gone!!

[LizStreithorst]

Get some Bristle Nose. Also a Magnum HOT 250 if you can find one.

[nc0gnet0]

Also a Magnum HOT 250 if you can find one.

+1 I have one on all my tanks, either a hot magnum or a magnum 350.

[Scott293]

My Hot Magnum does great but I came across a Fluval 405 for cheap. I just got new media for it and a couple new parts but haven't tried it yet. Do they work very well? ...Scott

[ericatdallas]

I have a Fluval 405, a whisper 60, a Hydro Pond IV, and two plecos. Crystal clear water.... people who visit often comment on how clean the tank looks even an hour or so before a WC is due. I had the same problem as you did before I added the plecos and fluval. Not sure which is the reason, but if I had to guess I would say Fluval has the greatest impact.

[nc0gnet0]

but if I had to guess I would say Fluval has the greatest impact.

Well I would have to disagree with this statement. The '05's series of fluvals (205,305,405) are mediocre filters at best. They do a good job with biological filtering but are, in my opinion, lousy at water polishing. The fx5 is a different story and a different beast. The reason for this (the 05's being bad at water polishing) is they have way too much engineered bypass.

[TURQ64]

+1 I have one on all my tanks, either a hot magnum or a magnum 350.
I keep three 350's up and running..They're all at least 22 years old...I also use sumps and wet/dry's, so I mostly polish with the Magnums..they are really hard to beat for a bunch of plastic!..I aslo keep Penguins running; the bio-wheels are a few decades old, turn r-e-a-l-l-y slow...the new ones I have don't impress me a bit..noisey, and I can't see how the wheels can remove anything with their high rpm's..sorry for the thread drift..

[nc0gnet0]

I run inline 36W uv sterilers on two of my magnums for a one two punch.

[Radiation]

I am using German Blue Ram to clean my tank .. so far so good

[konceppt]

Why bristlenose plecs over any other type?

[TURQ64]

They are reputed to be the most 'brnign' around Discus...Not my view, just supplying an answer........

[konceppt]

you mean benign?

[TURQ64]

yeah, finger is still asleep..

[konceppt]

lol,Thought it may be a fishkeepers acronym for something

[DerekFF]

well irreguardless of the kind of filter you have, the more water movement you have, the better particles will get filtered out. If the best filter in the world can only circulate water in part of the tank and theres some slower water areas, or dead space then the debris will settle there and your filter wont get it back until it gets kicked up again into the water column where it can pull it out. Not sure what kinda tank set up you have but obv you have some wood in there as you said. Shrimp dont eat algae off the glass....and theyre still gonna poo out w/e they eat in so they wont really "clean' then particles in the tank since shrimp poo is....well....particles lol. So i guess my advice would be to make sure you have good water movement so that whatever filter you do have can work as best it can. BNP and RCS are clean up crews but clean up crews are just clean up hiders really.

[ericatdallas]

Well I would have to disagree with this statement. The '05's series of fluvals (205,305,405) are mediocre filters at best. They do a good job with biological filtering but are, in my opinion, lousy at water polishing. The fx5 is a different story and a different beast. The reason for this (the 05's being bad at water polishing) is they have way too much engineered bypass.

So you think the Whisper, Plecos, or Sponge filter had the greater impact than the Fluval 405?

[TURQ64]

Aside from thread-drift, I have a tankful of Crystal Red Shrimp side by side with a community fish tank. I find it interesting to see how the shrimp hang on the side that abutts the fish, and basically 'tease' the fish..The fish hang on that side trying to figure out how to get to that fine looking dinner!...

[Silent Running]

I had a thriving and multiplying community of RCS in my heavily planted tank prior to adding my discus. And then, there were none :). I would also add a warning about the bristle nose plecos - I would only add them to a glass aquarium. Mine absolutely destroyed the clarity of my acrylic tank.

Check out the before and after shots of the damage the plecos did to the front pane on my tank. Both of these shots are looking through the left side of the tank.

Before adding the bristle nose...
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v502/kohlrabi1023/IMG_2501.jpg

After adding the bristle nose...
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v502/kohlrabi1023/IMG_6616.jpg