Shrimpie123

I live in Georgia and we are actually in the way of the current Tropical Storm. I currently use APC BR1500G Backups on my shrimp tanks, which keep the power on them running for at minimum 2 hours. Unless something catastrophic happens this has been plenty of time in my experience to "weather" the storm.

I am not an expert at this, but as a fisherman, I know that we used to buy rather robust DC airpumps that ran on D cell batteries for a couple of bucks to keep our bait alive.
Granted, after learning a bit more I think our efforts might have been in vain. We were thinking that the water was losing oxygen. We really should have been worrying more about getting the nitrates and such out of the water column.
 
Sponge filters run off of an air pump and do an excellent job. It wouldn't hurt to have one that had some good bacteria on it and was ready to go(though I will leave that to the experts). Some people run sponge filters on air pumps as their sole filtering since they are cheap and efficient.

This is exactly what I do. I keep a double sponge filter running in all my tanks, even those with HOB filters. This way if the power goes out, I can just plug the airline into a battery-powered pump. I got this one http://www.drsfostersmith.com/product/prod_display.cfm?pcatid=3693 but there are more expensive ones like this one http://www.drsfostersmith.com/product/prod_display.cfm?pcatid=8120 that will switch to battery automatically if the power goes out.
 

Gorgeous blue bolt!

One of my favorite steels

Thanks guys. I actually just sold a bunch. Will be moving them to my pinto tank and redoing this tank. I used some AS that is over 2 years old now and is pretty muddy.

This is what I'm talking about!  This is the type of information that will make people try the hobby and have success.  This is what will build shrimping in America.  GREAT POST!

First time I used Amazonia I was having ammonia in the 8 ppm range for a couple weeks then it dropped to 4 with an accompanied spike I nitrate to at least 160. This lasted another 4 weeks! It was crazy. Finally I got ammonia down to 0 and nitrate resting just under 5 when I finally added fish and shrimp. So it took me about 1.5 months!

ADA Amazonia took 1 month for my 20-40Gs all soil substrates.  The beginning yielded lots of brown and green string algae..do not get discouraged!

Everything looks fine, save for the lighting mishap.  I haven't used Amazonia myself but most report seeing ammonia leech for several (3-4+) weeks after initial setup.  
 
Let the cycle complete and you should be well on your way.  
 
I would consider picking up a timer for your lights

well I plant it very sparsely... . so it takes 2 -3 weeks. but it can take longer for it to get extremely full....

Everything depends of the water you are using for water changes and the amount of the plants you have.
 
tap water is killing buffering capacity, plants are absorbing nutrition from the soil.
I have some 4 year tanks still running great. I use RO water and have only moss in it. 
 
Biggest problem for me is : dramatically decrease of breeding and babies surviving rate when substrate get older than 2 years.
I experience it  in 15 tanks already.
Now I'm testing some additives  to bust soil activity and to return breeding level. 
.

thats really the best method.
 

Thanks! Yep, no losses and all still look healthy. Params:


 


TDS: 137


PH: 6.2


GH: 6


Ammonia: 0


Nitrite: 0


Nitrate: <5


Temp: 73F-75F

I'm really glad you did not buy from ShrimpUSA. I will definitely remember those sellers. Thanks for the heads up. 

I'm new to the hobby and I'm doing my best. I just don't like seeing them sickly. Hoping they do alright even if they didn't come from the best seller. 

I personally do not think they are Bloody Mary. They don't have red legs and their bodies aren't all solid red. Shrimp USA sold them. One of them arrive with Scul Japonica that I had to treat and decided to treat whole tank since the bulk were from them. I have three Royal Blue Tigers with orange eyes doing AMAZING from AlphaProBreeders and nearly two dozen shrimplets doing great. So the only ones doing poorly are the ones from ShrimpUSA. I have two sakuras from a LFS that are also doing well. 

I personally do not think they are Bloody Mary. They don't have red legs and their bodies aren't all solid red. Shrimp USA sold them. One of them arrive with Scul Japonica that I had to treat and decided to treat whole tank since the bulk were from them. I have three Royal Blue Tigers with orange eyes doing AMAZING from AlphaProBreeders and nearly two dozen shrimplets doing great. So the only ones doing poorly are the ones from ShrimpUSA. I have two sakuras from a LFS that are also doing well. 

I normally see that dark area in shrimp that are older in age. The discoloration does not mean the shrimp will die right away, but it is getting up there in age and might naturally come to an end soon. 
 
Best advice ask for juvies any time you buy. Young shrimp acclimate much better and you know for a fact that you have a good chance of a mix group of males/females.

I just had Scutariella japonica on a bloody mary shrimp I received from a US "breeder" that I have since learned is not reputable. I learned from Rachel O'Leary that PraziPro is invert safe. I used it on my entire tank because the bulk of my shrimp were these new BM's. I wasn't sure how many others were infected but had not begun to show signs. It was gone right away. She advised I remove the molts for a while to ensure they don't ingest it again. I have been removing the molts for a couple weeks (there have been a lot of them). I think I am in the clear. She said the salt dips work instantly but can be a little more hard on the shrimp. 

I just had Scutariella japonica on a bloody mary shrimp I received from a US "breeder" that I have since learned is not reputable. I learned from Rachel O'Leary that PraziPro is invert safe. I used it on my entire tank because the bulk of my shrimp were these new BM's. I wasn't sure how many others were infected but had not begun to show signs. It was gone right away. She advised I remove the molts for a while to ensure they don't ingest it again. I have been removing the molts for a couple weeks (there have been a lot of them). I think I am in the clear. She said the salt dips work instantly but can be a little more hard on the shrimp. 

I just had Scutariella japonica on a bloody mary shrimp I received from a US "breeder" that I have since learned is not reputable. I learned from Rachel O'Leary that PraziPro is invert safe. I used it on my entire tank because the bulk of my shrimp were these new BM's. I wasn't sure how many others were infected but had not begun to show signs. It was gone right away. She advised I remove the molts for a while to ensure they don't ingest it again. I have been removing the molts for a couple weeks (there have been a lot of them). I think I am in the clear. She said the salt dips work instantly but can be a little more hard on the shrimp. 

This is something I noticed for the past few years regardless what I do with temps and light cycles. Winter time (in Florida) the breeding slows down big time even if cold for us is 70. Spring there's a big surge of breeding and this stays true till mid Autumn when it starts to slow down again. 
 
Even with multiple tanks they all seem to follow the same pattern & friends in my area that I asked experience similar patterns.

I just had Scutariella japonica on a bloody mary shrimp I received from a US "breeder" that I have since learned is not reputable. I learned from Rachel O'Leary that PraziPro is invert safe. I used it on my entire tank because the bulk of my shrimp were these new BM's. I wasn't sure how many others were infected but had not begun to show signs. It was gone right away. She advised I remove the molts for a while to ensure they don't ingest it again. I have been removing the molts for a couple weeks (there have been a lot of them). I think I am in the clear. She said the salt dips work instantly but can be a little more hard on the shrimp.