# shrimp and lily pipes



## Dave Allen (Aug 5, 2011)

Here's a question for all the shrimpheads out there.

I just got some lily pipes (thats to fellow member somewhatshocked). I currently have a sponge on my inlet, but I really don't want that ugly black sponge on on the pipes. Has anyone experimented with an inline prefilter/shrimp trap that could go between the inlet and the cannister? I wonder if there is an off the shelf product like this or if I'd have to prototype it myself.

Anyone have any thoughts? Thanks!


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## willknowitall (Oct 3, 2010)

the problem is every shrimp in your tank will end up in the trap
you want to stop as many as possible from entering intake
i have had sponges over intake and still find many baby shrimp in filter when cleaning
i use nylon netting now attached with elastic band but have no lilly pipe
but this works better and doesn't clog s easily and less shrimp enter


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## somewhatshocked (Aug 8, 2011)

The best solution is a 12mm stainless steel shrimp strainer/intake cover. They're $12-$15, usually.

I picked mine up from mordalphus in the Power Sellers section. A couple other sellers have them, as well.

They're much smaller than a Fluval Edge sponge and look more attractive in water.


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## swampslop (Aug 3, 2015)

I have 12mm lily pipes w/ an inlet that has slits that are pretty small. No shrimp ever get stuck on it, but when I have newborn red cherry shrimp babies they get sucked into the canister filter. I am new to RCS and during my last hatch I figured some of the hatchlings would get sucked up so I tried the nylon thing but it was ugly and didn't work well. I like you just want glass, I have the inlet at the front side of the tank. After opening my filter to clean it, I was really careful to inspect every drop of water from my filter to see if there were any live/dead hatchlings and to my surprise I had 7 of them in there, they must have been around 2 weeks old or so. They were much easier to find and catch than I thought, and there were zero dead ones. I then inspected my filter a week later and there were none in there. They either had learned their lesson or get big enough after a couple weeks to not go through the slits. 

I found this post because I was curious if there was some kind of inline shrimp filter because I think it is actually a pretty good nursery for them in there. When they are first hatched I think that they are much more likely to get eaten by the fish. It would be sweet if there was some kind of inline nursery they could be happy and live in for a month or so until they got a little bigger. Would be easier than having to open up the filter (though I am cleaning it much more often now). I only have threadfin rainbows which have very small mouths and leave the shrimp alone but I'm considering getting cardinal tetras and possibly german blue rams and know they will eat some of the young. Hopefully the adults will be to big and fast though, we will see. I started with around 7 RCS and now probably have 40 or so in a 60p (17 gallon).

Just realized how long this post got, haha, anyway maybe not the best method but at least if they get sucked up (which they only seem to do in the first couple weeks) then check your filter.


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## Smokey3737 (Jan 18, 2021)

That's such a great idea! Inline shrimp nursery. It's now five years later 😂 did you find anything that worked?


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## JavelinJohnson (4 mo ago)

Smokey3737 said:


> That's such a great idea! Inline shrimp nursery. It's now five years later 😂 did you find anything that worked?


He's still working on it


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