# Red Cherry Shrimp and Cardinal Tetras



## slicebo123

Hey. So i know there are probably hundreds of posts asking if x shrimp is ok with y fish. My 10 gallon has 6 red cherries in there right now. I'm about to put in 12 cardinal tetras in there as well. From what I can tell, my adult cherries should be safe (they got a full carpet of HC and a forest of blyxa to hide in, if necessary). Enough background.

So my question is, if the red cherry shrimp breed naturally, what sort of equilibrium will be established between the cardinals and the shrimp? Can I expect nearly all the baby shrimp to be eaten? Will the population slowly rise? I am hoping that if i let natural selection take its course, the population will grow slowly which will allow me to eventually sell off my 6 amanos. My guess would be that the baby shrimp should be able to take refuge in the HC carpet. 

ps. this is assuming i keep my cardinals well fed so they don't have to chase shrimp around.

any advice/personal stories appreciated.


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## mordalphus

basically you will never see your shrimp if you provide hiding places, and if you don't provide hiding, they will be eaten. Even adults. After they molt they are basically jelly for a few hours. During that time they can be torn apart and eaten by small fish.

also they smell like fish food! And look like fish food. Most fish flakes are made of shrimp! And most flakes are bright red!


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## Noahma

mordalphus said:


> basically you will never see your shrimp if you provide hiding places, and if you don't provide hiding, they will be eaten. Even adults. After they molt they are basically jelly for a few hours. During that time they can be torn apart and eaten by small fish.
> 
> also they smell like fish food! And look like fish food. Most fish flakes are made of shrimp! And most flakes are bright red!


You will most certainly see your cherry's.
I have a very densely planted tank (see pic below) I have Neon Tetras, Dwarf Neon Rainbowfish, Zebra Danio's, Threadfin Rainbowfish, Glowlight tetras, a Dwarf Gourami, and well...... about 200-300ish somewhere abouts Cherry shrimp. I started with 9 cherry shrimp in this tank in Dec. so in about 8 months, this tank went from 9 cherry shrimp to a couple hundred within 7-8 months. I cannot glance in the tank without seeing a butt load of cherry shrimp either crawling across the substrate, or "tug boating" across the water column. 

I have not kept Cardinals with cherry shrimp, but what I remember of there temperament they are much like Neon Tetras, this might pose a problem to your youngin cherry's, But if you give them lots of very small hiding spots, they should be able to reproduce, now how many of the babies get eaten depends on how many of the babies wander out of the hiding spots before they are large enough to be safe. I now have seen babies as small as several mm crawling about my moss balls in the open part of the tank with little issue. 

With your tank being a 10 gallon, you might want to rethink your purchase of the Cardinals and go with a handful of the Neon or other smaller tetras (green neon's are beautiful, and very small) The cardinals if able to find the baby's will make quick work of them. But the adults will be ok. If you are able to, get a larger tank, to ensure enough room for all


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## timwag2001

what do you think is the difference between neons and cardinals? they both grow to the same size right?


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## Noahma

timwag2001 said:


> what do you think is the difference between neons and cardinals? they both grow to the same size right?


in the past my cardinals would always reach around 2" in length, whereas my Neons would reach 1-1.5"


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## lauraleellbp

timwag2001 said:


> what do you think is the difference between neons and cardinals? they both grow to the same size right?


In addition to size, Cardinals prefer warmer temps (low 80s) to Neons (mid 70s).

IME Cardinals WILL eat some shrimplets, and I even had some Cardinals gang up and strip a berried female RCS of her eggs once, but my RCS population remained at least stable if not increased, since the shrimp had plenty of hiding places in my tank.

That was stocking 50x Cardinal tetras in my 46gal with probably 50-100 RCS in there.

I'd definitely make sure the shrimp were well established before adding the tetras, though.


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## slicebo123

thx. all good advice. i think i may opt for the green tetras. they've always been a favorite of mine and i've never personally owned them. Do you know where I could purchase some in the San Francisco/bay area? I think i got ripped off on Aquabid. I paid 30 bucks for 12 cardinal tetras. the jerk never responded once i paid him through paypal :angryfire. Good news, my shrimps are pregnant.


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## Chrisinator

Nice tank


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## IWANNAGOFAST

Hey slicebo123, 

nice to see you're from the bay area, you should check out sfbaaps.org, great group of very knowledgeable people.

Regarding your question, it's pretty hard to find green neons, I have them but took me a while to find anything. I found a few at AFA in the city and a few here and there, but your best bet is to contact this one seller, I'll PM you his info, I found him on aquabid and contacted him directly. Good pricing and fast shipment since he's from oregon, fish were very healthy.

I love the green neons, the blue stripe on them runs all the way from front to back like on the cardinals, but they don't have any red. They do look amazing in a school though. Much better then the run of the mill neon tetras. I used to have about 40 of them in my 20 long, they stay very small, about half the size of a cardinal, maxing out at 1inch so you can put a lot of them in a tank, and since they're smaller they won't really be able to prey on the larger shrimp.

Also, if you provide enough hiding spots, your population will grow, just not as fast as if you had the shrimp by themselves.


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## slicebo123

awesome. yeah i frequent the sfbaaps website. there's so much great information on there. i feel like i've inadvertently become a novice water chemist in the process. 

thx for the info on the green tetras. i'm looking forward to gettin them. I'm really curious to see how natural selection will affect my shrimp population.


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## Noahma

from what my LFS told me, Green Neons are a seasonal fish, they are all still wild caught. we do have a LFS that LOVES to stock them, but can usually only get them a couple weeks out of the year, and sells out of them very quickly. They are a great fish, just wish I had soft enough water to keep them.


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## Captivate05

My mom has cardinal tetras and RCS in her tank, and the cardinals completely ignore the shrimp.


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## fresh.salty

I QT'd 30 cardinals in a 10g full of RCS. I really wish I'd put them in my cull tank and not the one with the bright reds.


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## BioBen nano

slicebo123 said:


> thx. all good advice. i think i may opt for the green tetras. they've always been a favorite of mine and i've never personally owned them. Do you know where I could purchase some in the San Francisco/bay area? I think i got ripped off on Aquabid. I paid 30 bucks for 12 cardinal tetras. the jerk never responded once i paid him through paypal :angryfire. Good news, my shrimps are pregnant.


In San Francisco, Ocean Aquarium on Cedar at Van Ness is my favorite LFS for planted aquarium stock. The owner, Justin, is very knowledgeable, and his fish are very healthy. Definitely your best bet for rare freshwater fish in the Bay Area. Bring a water sample from your home tank or he may not sell you any fish at first! He wants the fish to survive, and will test the water for free to make sure they'll be ok. 

Keep an eye on his weblog http://oceanaquarium.blogspot.com/ to see when new shipments come in, or send him an email.

http://www.yelp.com/biz/ocean-aquarium-san-francisco


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## hbosman

Noahma said:


> You will most certainly see your cherry's.
> I have a very densely planted tank (see pic below) I have Neon Tetras, Dwarf Neon Rainbowfish, Zebra Danio's, Threadfin Rainbowfish, Glowlight tetras, a Dwarf Gourami, and well...... about 200-300ish somewhere abouts Cherry shrimp. I started with 9 cherry shrimp in this tank in Dec. so in about 8 months, this tank went from 9 cherry shrimp to a couple hundred within 7-8 months. I cannot glance in the tank without seeing a butt load of cherry shrimp either crawling across the substrate, or "tug boating" across the water column.
> 
> I have not kept Cardinals with cherry shrimp, but what I remember of there temperament they are much like Neon Tetras, this might pose a problem to your youngin cherry's, But if you give them lots of very small hiding spots, they should be able to reproduce, now how many of the babies get eaten depends on how many of the babies wander out of the hiding spots before they are large enough to be safe. I now have seen babies as small as several mm crawling about my moss balls in the open part of the tank with little issue.
> 
> With your tank being a 10 gallon, you might want to rethink your purchase of the Cardinals and go with a handful of the Neon or other smaller tetras (green neon's are beautiful, and very small) The cardinals if able to find the baby's will make quick work of them. But the adults will be ok. If you are able to, get a larger tank, to ensure enough room for all


I have to agree. I have a 46 gallon bowfront that is heavily planted. I have about 20 cardinals in there and probably 20 red cherry shrimp. I started with 6 shrimp and at one point had RCS in the hundreds. The Cardinals have developed a tast for the shrimp so the population has reduced. They most likely eat the babies, I don't see babies too much anymore so I imagine they are staying hidden since the RCS population seems have stabilized at about twenty. Every once in awhile, I will see a Cardinal swimming around trying to swallow an adult shrimp.

I think the RCS breed quickly enough to maintain there population, I've had the shrimp for almost two years and they haven't gone extinct in my tank yet. I do see the adults hanging around eating rather casually. They seem confident in there ability to out swim the Cardinals and they usually do.


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## plantbrain

I have at least 300 or each in this tank, 300 cards and no less than that for RCS.

If I feed the fish, then net some RCS up and then toss them back with the food, the fish will eat or try and eat them. But when the RCS are on the wood, the cards swim right past.

Regards, 
Tom Barr


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## Midnkight

^^ wow...  that a lot critters. 

You can do what i did in my 29 gallon, and i have mention it on this forum before. I used those breeder nets, and kept the berry shrimp in there, and release her back into the tank when she drop the shrimplets. Then keep the juvy in there till they are large enough to not be eaten. I was able to keep a good amount in there and my population easily double/Triple. 

One thing to note is that, a lot of green algae collected on the net.  so i always end up cleaning it in old tank water every month or so.


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## aquafella

Hi, I have a situation here..I have a 5 gallon lowtech tank..I have around 20 guppy fry, 2 neons, 2 cardinals and 19 rcs..i have java fern and java moss and anacharis planted with 2 driftwoods and some smooth stones for hiding..question is, will my rcs multipy even if i have tetras on there? will they survive like nature taking it's course? I know some will die and be eaten but some may hide among the rocks and plants..will there be any chance that some may survive?

Here's my tank set up..


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