danielt

They breed only in brackish or saline water, although they will lay eggs the larvae that hatch from them does not survive the freshwater environment.

Indian Almond Leaves. Aka Catappa Leaves.

Use IAL and feed 2-3 times a week. Try to feed a smaller quantity and just leave it in the tank as they will eventually find it. Try to keep from feeding high animal protein content as that fouls the water quicker. I also use lots of dried leaves from various plants most of them from tea bags. Mulberry leaves, nettle leaves etc.

MTS is a good snail to keep in any aquarium, they seem to eat just about anything preventing gas pockets and aerating the substrate. This prevents anaerobic hydrogen sulfurous gas to accumulate and bomb the tank. I didn't had that happen to me but folks with lots of decaying matter in the substrate are particularly susceptible to this.

Better to raise it via water change schedule. Don't do it fast, don't do it all at once, don't put remineralizer directly in the tank.

Just do the water changes as usual or once a week if you do them rarer than that. With the hardness set at the desired value it will increase over time in the tank as well. Don't do water changes in larger quantities than usual.

The above applies in case you're not experiencing deaths.

I keep CRS/CBS with inert quartz sand. I still don't monitor pH. 

Yup, it's a matter of perspective. My BKKs and Shadows did well from the start in fresh setups. Up until this point (2 months later), I still don't know what the pH value is. No deaths and the 3-4 berried females seem to confirm they're not doing that bad

Stop speculating. Without actual tests you can speculate about anything and that leads to myths in this hobby. I don't test for pH as much as I test for TDS, nitrites, gH. Ammonia is quickly absorbed, nitrites not so much. Both of them are deadly in low concentrations. Whether the bio filter is bombed or not it doesn't matter much as long as ammonia and nitrites are 0. Most of the bio filters are supersized when it comes to shrimp. It shouldn't be a problem if part of your bio filter dies as long as it still does it's job, keeping ammonia and nitrites undetectable.

I don't do that

It's a waste of time to monitor pH. Do your water changes on time, remineralize according to the species reqs and that's all.

I do believe pH swings kill by the ammonia route. Poor water circulation + poor filtration + pH swing can cause a deadly ammonia(NH3) spike which otherwise stays in the ammonium(NH4) form if your pH value remains in the acidic range (<7).

That's a pretty good question. I'm curious if someone has a good argument.

Have you tested for ammonia? Nitrites? That's an indicator, not biofilm turning white and a couple of shrimp succumbing to what might have been age or weakness + peroxide exposure.

kH is bad for high spec Caridinas you need to keep it as low as possible. ADA substrate helps in that regard, Shirakura Red Bee sand is also a well established brand.

Neos need kH in the range 2-4dkH and tolerate even higher. 

Try a slice of cucumber. Do the same to have it sink. 

It's important to know what hardness has the tap water. RO will be the same every time. Tap might vary when seasons change.

I don't believe peroxide has anything to do with your problem. I've dosed 2.5ml of 3% peroxide in 10L of water without any noticeable deaths. I have around 60 RCS in this tank.

Opposite to mulm bombing the tank you can add. Tetra Safe Start if it's available. Or any bacterial start culture.

One thing to note, peroxide will attack any living tissue as it quickly reacts to living cells breaking the membrane. The deaths might have been because of that. Not because of a bio filter being killed.

First and foremost get acquainted with a RO unit. If you don't have one get one. Get used to remineralizing the RO water. Get a TDS meter. Maintain stable and high quality water in your existing tanks. TDS and hardness are key. Once you can maintain stability over water changes, get more and more difficult shrimp. Go overboard with filtration on the high spec tanks. That means you need to get another tank(s) for your high grade shrimp. Neos don't fare well with Caridina species and the other way around. You can get away with keeping Crystal Red/Black together with Neos but higher spec Caridinas don't tolerate this well.

Too much sugar is not the problem. Too much protein is. That will bump everything up involved in the nitrogen cycle. Sugars are broken down on a different pathway and don't pollute as much. The bacterial and fungi bloom provides food for the shrimp.

I suspect there's something like an aroma in the foods that attract shrimp more. It's not just the contents but the smell also. I found shrimp are attracted to all kings of smells. For instance, cinnamon, gingko biloba and other types of aromas tend to attract shrimp more. Maca root powder makes them go wild. It's not necessarily the contents or the fact they became stale. 

Main concern is the O2 saturation. Shrimp fry die pretty quickly in O2 starved environments. Also the acidic effect of CO2 is stronger than having an acidic pH. It's NOT the same thing although looks like. Acidic water is not the same as putting an acid in it which you do if you dose CO2.

A definite NO to CO2

Some of it survived. It seems the irregular lighting has a more powerful effect than the peroxide. Don't know for sure which was better since I wanted the hairballs out.

My schedule with algae growing: 8:00am - 10:00pm

My schedule with algae dying: 8:00am - 12:00 - lights off - 4:00pm - 8:00pm

Notice that I shortened the light program also. Coupled with 2.5ml of hydrogen peroxide in a net volume of 10 liters nuked the algae. I keep neos in that tank, but you can dose less if you have a concern it will harm shrimp.

I have pink ramshorns. I had common ones in the past and lost them. This time they took over the tank in less than a month. Eggs everywhere. They compete with shrimp for food unless you put the food where the snails can't reach. Since they are not good swimmers you can hang a feeding dish out of their reach.

This time I started off with 6 ramshorns. Now I have a couple hundred.

Mistery snails or snails too small are a pain. They reach into your filter, multiply very fast and it's hard to nuke them. Assassin snails will wipe everything out if they're hungry.

I tried Nori sheets. It's used to wrap sushi in. They're not too interested in it although it's rich in fibers and cellulose. Snails prefer it but not that much. Tried with great acceptance dried mango and papaya bits.

Found rice sheets used to wrap chinese spring rolls. These work also fairly well. They are see-trough thin. Don't seem to pollute much. They also work via carbohydrates -> bacterial growth -> shrimp feed pathway. Although shrimps will clamor on it right away.

Let's see your ingredients. I found some common or uncommon stuff that shrimp like and seems otherwise harmless.

Rice noodles. Shrimp graze on them like crazy. I have some fresh pics in the gallery with shrimps on rice noodles.

Acerola powder sinks and they also go for that. There are other ingredients from the nature shop I found the shrimp like so let's make a list of what you found that works.