# 10 Gallon Starfire Shrimp tank



## jimmyjam

*"Wired" 10 Gallon Starfire Shrimpscape*

Hey guys its been a while since I started a tank. After checking out Tommy's setup at Shrimpfever, I got the itch again. So I went over the AI and picked me up a 40x30x30cm tank. I picked up the driftwood from big als for 17 bucks.. a total steal, and some ADA from Shrimpfever.com

I am framing a LED light fixture that I got previously I will decide if I will keep that light or buy some 6x3w fixture off ebay, once its done.. meaning if I f'up then Ill toss it and buy one online. In the meanwhile, I will use my 2x25 watt spiral daylight bulbs with a old exoterra fixture on it.

I am looking to keep Blue bolts in there, so I am also going to invest in a R/O unit. Any advice from those who have bred and kept Blue bolts in the past? What kind of water parameters did you keep.

Here is the hardscape, and I also suck some pics of my apisto from my 75 gallon in the clinic, and 47 gallon aquascape in there too =P


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## FlyingHellFish

Looking good, how was the ADA AquaSoil?


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## jimmyjam

looks legit, but havent tested it yet, Ill get back to you on that. I have bought fake aquasoil before wihtout knowing, and have noticed a big difference. So I will see, but Im pretty sure this is the real stuff.


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## Shrimp Daddy

jimmyjam said:


> looks legit, but havent tested it yet, Ill get back to you on that. I have bought fake aquasoil before, and have noticed a big difference. So I will see, but Im pretty sure this is the real stuff.


Why did you buy the fake stuff? Sometimes trying to save a few bucks does more harm than good. Stick with the legitimate stuff.


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## Jaysan

Shrimp Daddy said:


> Why did you buy the fake stuff? Sometimes trying to save a few bucks does more harm than good. Stick with the legitimate stuff.


I don't think he knowingly bought the fake stuff. Awhile back, some of the aquasoils didnt buffer ph. (fake ones)


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## jimmyjam

Shrimp Daddy said:


> Why did you buy the fake stuff? Sometimes trying to save a few bucks does more harm than good. Stick with the legitimate stuff.


Why would anyone buy fake Aquasoil lol? Def got ripped off there, I wont name names, but they are a local dealer, which I had all the confidence in.


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## jimmyjam

Hey Jay how is your shrimp tank going? What is the water specs? Im debating on a RO system right now, I figure I can convince the wife that would be good drinking water, but to commit to a RO for a 10 gallon is a bit much I think.



Jaysan said:


> I don't think he knowingly bought the fake stuff. Awhile back, some of the aquasoils didnt buffer ph. (fake ones)


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## jimmyjam

just finished scapeing the tank, the water is a bit murkey, so Ill post a pic tomorrow.


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## jimmyjam

Finally setup the tank, and scaped it. 3 days in, ammonia spike at 4. I did a 40% water change, and now sitting back for it to clear up.
I am also doing a DIY LED setup. There are 12x 1 or 1.5 watt LED's ..Its been used for about 18 months, so its not as strong as before, hope its not too much light.
Right now, I have 2x25 watt spiral compact florescent on there, but its a bit dim for my likeing.. I guess Im still a aquascaper at heart.

Flora: Cryp Parva, glosso, fissidans, peacock moss, belems dwarf hair grass and bolbitis

fauna: so far 5 trumpet snails.. love those guys

Sorry for the crappy iphone pics, I will have nice dslr shots when the tank is all settled.

The last pic is a frozen pigeon... RIP mr pigeon


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## jimmyjam

Just finished making my LED light. I looks awesome, and the lights are nice and bright. I think the kalvins is only 5000, so not in the best spectrum, but the whole setup cost me only 7 bucks; I cant complain. The Glosso is already growing nicely, sending multiple runners. The Belems dhg is taking its time though, I guess its because light is being blocked by the driftwood. Enjoy. In my main 75 gallon, I also picked up some awesome checker board dwarf cichlid














































from Johnny at gold ocean aquarium at leslie and 7, that guy has the biggest collection of apistos and other dwarf cichlids, he also picked up some wild apies, and peruvian spotted angles!


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## jimmyjam

Just added some low grade fire red males in there to test out the waters, 3 days and they seem fine. But the ammonia is still about 2, and nitrates are about 5ppm now, so it looks like its half way there through the cycle. Now I really need to think hard as if I will invest in this RO, or just buy buckets of RO. What do you think guys. 

If I get one, I will def get a under the sink 3 gallon tank for drinking purposes, and I might potentially setup 1 or two more small shrimp tanks for breeding purposes. Do I really need a whole RO system for a few tanks?


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## jimmyjam

Just added some painted and higher end fire reds, and a few endlers to eat up all the little water fleas thats building up.

Do anyone know what the difference between the painted fire reds that is all red and the ones with a lighter red band that runs right along the dorsal of the body?


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## randy

There are many grading rules but this one seems to be followed by many.










PS: this chart is not mine, it's just a link I use from the internet for reference.


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## Jiinx

*What a great centre piece!*

I love this tank. It fits so nicely snuggled above your fireplace. The wood really catches your eye and so does the bright green flora. I looove fire reds and yours look exceptional! Well done 

sarah


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## jimmyjam

Here is a berries fire red

and the next pics are of my "blue tint sparkle butt" fire red males;p

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## jimmyjam

Thanks randy, thats pretty clear cut for me. Im going to get a few batches from these guys, put them back in my 49, then start switching water to RO, and then straight to higher end CRS, and then taiwan bees. Hope I get a colony before golf season starts =)



randy said:


> There are many grading rules but this one seems to be followed by many.
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> PS: this chart is not mine, it's just a link I use from the internet for reference.


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## jimmyjam

THanks Sarah, you have an amazing tank as well. I cant wait to meet you to trade some of these for you mini reineiki and see your setup. Give me a couple of weeks.



Jiinx said:


> I love this tank. It fits so nicely snuggled above your fireplace. The wood really catches your eye and so does the bright green flora. I looove fire reds and yours look exceptional! Well done
> 
> sarah


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## jimmyjam

Here are a few more pics . Also have. Random neo cross between blue / green and fire reds .






































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## jimmyjam

Got my RO unit up and running, so far im doing half tap/half Ro .. 
gh-4, kh 2
ph 6.5
tds: waiting for my ebay order, damn the china shipments... its been about a month

I threw about 10 CRS in there.. s-SS grades

2 are berried, and its only been 2 weeks.

Since I added the RO, I did see 2 PFR die off, Im guessing buddy wasnt feeling the low GH, KH

On another note, I went to check out Randy's shrimp dreamhouse the other day, man does he every have some nice shrimp. I learned a lot from him, and will be getting some higher end shrimps once my numbers are settled. He has this PRL and golden that was out of this world. I also saw beautiful blue bolts that I will getting my hands on. I really enjoyed meeting him, thanks Randy. In one of the pics, you will notice a formula cap, inside consists of this new type of barley called snowflake, and it seems my CRs and especially the PFR loves picking at it, thanks for the sample Randy.


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## randy

Hi Jimmy, thanks for the kind words and it was my pleasure to have you over. It's one of the things I like the most in this hobby to meet up hobbyists and talk about shrimps.

That snow flake food is the latest thing in Taiwan, it's not made of barley but it's made the same way of barley straw pellet most of us have been feeding. I don't know any special properties it has but a few leading breeders are promoting it, my shrimps definitely love it.


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## jimmyjam

yeah randy its been really good in my tank, I just need better way to feed them so it doesnt get everywhere.

I also need to switch up the filter in there, there just isnt enough circulation. There is hardly any surface agitation. The motor on this puppy is too old for its own good, and adding a sponge on the intake just kills the flow even more.


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## randy

This is an example of people using this new snow flake food. A bit extreme I think. But if he feeds it to that tank of shrimps (I would think worth much more than $10k in that tank) .... I'm sure he is confident about it.


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## jimmyjam

i just changed the tank filter, I realized my hob filter had 2 crs that climbed up into the filter and died... bloody bastards... anyhoot. On a brighter note, I finally setup the 30 gallon. I partitioned it with 1/3 bare bottom, added ADA. One side has a UGF, and other side has a sponge. I think this will be good for a massive CRS colony. Im just going to add moss to this setup. with the aquascaping blood in me, I already started thinking about how I can make it look pretty... I gotta stop lol. moss only.. ok maybe a few ferns in there too.

Randy, wow to those twb. Those are beauties.


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## jimmyjam

2 more CRS are berried. I also found some fire red babies, but no CRS babies even though the first Berried CRS is not holding anymore.
I also added a mineral rock... does this stuff actually have any research behind it?

The one thing I hate about this tank is the amount of Algae.. Im have a staghorn problem, and all I can do for it is manually remove it (which is so hard!) One of the things I hate about crs tanks is their sensitivity to..well everything.. If its any of my planted tanks, I would have injected excel or peroxide by now. Ill just have to suck it up, reduce the lighting and put some more riccia at the top to suck up some more nutrients.


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## randy

Newborns are extremely good at hiding, normally you see them in the first few hours then they hide until around one week mark. If the female isn't holding and it had been around 25 days, I think the changes are the babies are hiding.


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## jimmyjam

I hope thats all it is. She did not have a big saddle, so there was probably only 5-8 I would say. Randy what do you do to get bigger saddles and baby survivals?


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## randy

jimmyjam said:


> I hope thats all it is. She did not have a big saddle, so there was probably only 5-8 I would say. Randy what do you do to get bigger saddles and baby survivals?


I wish I knew the silver bullet. I know at least one Japanese breeder (Crimson) selectively breed lines of CRS with larger size, some others claims different ways to achieve this goal. I think it's just patience. The bigger the female, the more change you get a bigger clutch of eggs. Balanced nutrition and pristine water quality would definitely help. A few shrimp keepers commented on some of my huge female CRS and asked how I got them to grow so big, the truth is, they are just older ;-)

Others have indicated that feeding blood worms would induce females to get berried, I have observed the same thing but I stopped doing that because I'm lazy, and don't want to foul the water or introduce undesired pathogens in my tanks. High protein and things like lecithin should help reproduction in general, but be aware that when shrimps grow too fast, it can cause molting issues.

One thing I've found about the blue velvet / black rili / dream blue line is that they start breeding at a very small size (the few generations they've bred in my tank show the same behavior), and they don't grow to the humongous size like most other Neocaridina species.


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## jimmyjam

Thats a great post Randy. Thanks for the shrimp as well, they look great!

I have two of yours and two of my ss/sss lined up on the wall here. Its weird, they all look identical and they're the only ones on the wall eating away.

and I Just found another hino and no entry berried.


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## randy

Hi Jimmy, you're doing something right if you keep getting more and more berried shrimps. They look great in your tank.


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## jimmyjam

Thanks randy, my biggest beef with Shrimp tanks that do very well is the lack of ability for me to clean / disturb the tank. Look at the algae in that tank lol. For a aquascaper, every inch of algae kills me=p. All i wanna do is put my hands in there, take out all the staghorn, drain it 80% spot treat with peroxide, then do 2 days of double excel treatment lol.


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## randy

jimmyjam said:


> Thanks randy, my biggest beef with Shrimp tanks that do very well is the lack of ability for me to clean / disturb the tank. Look at the algae in that tank lol. For a aquascaper, every inch of algae kills me=p. All i wanna do is put my hands in there, take out all the staghorn, drain it 80% spot treat with peroxide, then do 2 days of double excel treatment lol.


Come to see my tanks again you will think you don't have an algae problem ;-)


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## jimmyjam

Added some mineral rock the other day, and then some of Randys mineral balls, and I got about 3-4 nice molts today, and shrimp are super active!


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## randy

Jimmy, thanks for testing the products. Those life balls just hit the shelves world-wide including the hardest to penetrate market -- Japan. Here is the link to its introduction on FB.


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## jimmyjam

they look good so far. I will def grab some more for larger tanks. It only makes sense. Randy can you do a quick description of exactly how it works.


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## randy

I think it's the tourmaline and maifanite that do the trick plus the trace. There are other similar products on the market. To be honest, I use them in my tank partially because they look cool ;-)

Here is the description from the product,

*Product Specialty:
This product reduces the ammonia in water, prevents growth of blue-green algae (cyanobacteria), and effectively maintains a stable PH aquarium environment.
This product contains more than 30 different minerals; it can effectively improve the mineral/trace element deficiency in aquatic animals/plants and promotes aquatic animals to be more active. The highly porous surface traps harmful substances in water to improve the general water quality.

Usage Instructions:
Use 10 MK-BREED LIFE BALLs in 100-150 liters of water.
Use 5 - 8 MK-BREED LIFE BALLs in water less than 100 literes.

Note:
Store in a cool and dry place.
Guaranteed Analysis:
Tourmaline, Maifanite, and more than 30 different minerals.*


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## jimmyjam

I just did my first official water change today (20 percent), so far so good, the shrimps still look decently active ( not too active). I have lost a few in the past from doing too much water change without proper TDS balance. I think I got it down this time. Because this tank is situated so high up already, it was tough to setup a drip system. So I got a plastic fish bag filled it with water, and closed it slightly with a elastic band. I tossed that in the tank, and slowly emptied the bag by pulling the empty portion of the bag out of the tank once in a while and clamping it down. I also cleared off a great deal of the staghorn, man was there a huge infestation. Its looking pretty good now. I'll post pics tomorrow.


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## jimmyjam

Here are some new pics . I have that neo hybrid I call green soldier, buddy is stealthy! Currently there are 5 berries pfr, and 2 crs (who likes to chill under the meshed moss cave I made.

I also added a sae to keep some of the algae at bay, what do you guys think about that ? 

















































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## randy

Tank looks great. I have some "wild form" Neocaridina too, they look greenish and I was trying to breed them to see if I can get something. The one in your pictures look much greener.


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## jimmyjam

I started off with light green version, with bands. IT basically looks like a pure yellow but green. This is a hybrid between some blue green and fire reds.. 

Randy: I left a message about the TDS up liquid on your phone via text


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## jimmyjam

tore down a 75 gallon plant holding tank with 3 levels.. we tore it down and found about 1000 hybrid/fire reds all neo, from orange to chocolate to blue and green. There are some massive ones in there about 1.5 inches.


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## randy

1000 ! Enough to make a dish ;-)


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## jimmyjam

One of my SS no entries just dropped. I saw her hiding upside down acting all weird, and all of a sudden, I saw two little white specks swimming away from the tree branch she was on, then I found another a fair ways away from her, some other shrimps stepped on the fry, and it swam off scared. Im a happy daddy right now. I couldnt get a pic, but I will post once they get big enough and come out of hiding.


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## jimmyjam

Just got some panda, bars and shadow pandas from randy. So far so good






























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## jimmyjam

My cheap but effective drip system for top ups.









I just poke some small holes in it, fill it up and let her rip , it does about 2 drips a second

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## randy

That's smart ;-) Is there a version that works for 20 tanks?


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## jimmyjam

hahaha ya its called backpain.


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## jimmyjam

Just removed the sae, and all the babies are coming out now, it was a pretty dumb move by me putting that guy in there in The first place.The aquascaper side of me was itching to get rid of the staghorn. Silly me.

Now that I took it out, I finally found a crs baby that I can photograph!

I've counted about 40-50 fire reds but couldn't find any crs with colours until today!

I'm pretty sure this is one of the offsprings of a ugly hino that was prego when I got it from kims nature last month.

I also found another hino with a nice little saddle.

The 30 gallon is almost ready, I'm gonna do a 100 percent water change tomorrow and get the water right and the. Start dumping all the fire reds and lower end crs in there, then in gonna pickup some blue bolts .

Randy do you have?

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## randy

Jim, your tank is doing well. Seeing berried shrimps is a good sign. CRS babies normally hide after the first day and won't show up until a week or so later, especially in a tank like your with plenty of plants and hiding places. For BB, I'll text you.


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## jimmyjam

Thanks randy , I just MSGed you about the bb. Here are some pics of the shadow pandas and the big prego no entry .






























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## jimmyjam

Just spotted 3 crs babies, they all seem like a/ s . 
I topped up the tank today with 5ml of the trace liquid made by RAndy. 4-5 shrimps molted today, and are very active, and as you can see, the babies are coming out of hiding.

I will be moving some fire reds to the 30 tomorrow to test out the tank. It's at 120 tds right now .

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## jimmyjam

Here is a cute little sss, hope he or she has lots of brothers and sisters in there .
















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## randy

Your shrimps don't wait for anything when breeding is concerned, very jealous ;-)

And be ready for tomorrow night's thunder storm..... not that your shrimp tanks will be flooded but you might be surprised Thursday morning. Good luck to those females who are ready to molt.


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## jimmyjam

http://gtaaquaria.com/forum/showthread.php?t=83353

All my shrimps are gonna be sold today check out the thread or pm me


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## jimmyjam

just moving , selling the whole setup

check out the sales thread

http://gtaaquaria.com/forum/showthread.php?t=97954


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