# Almost all of my shrimp died overnight.



## TheLordOfTheFish (Mar 11, 2017)

I have a 3 gallon planted low tech tank. It's 2 month old,cycled, 5 RCS and 2 of the blue colored kind. 1 Amano and 2 endlers.

Overnight, all but one of the shrimp died (Amano suicide jumped and made a run for the door before turning into a chip). 

For the past 2 months, my nitrates were high (40ppm) and I added frogbit 3 weeks ago to lower them and the day before all the shrimp died, I added Seachem Matrix and Seachem Phosgate (I have a diatom outbreak) to the filter. I kept 50% of the old filter substrate. I tested the water before adding the filter substrate and after the mass exodus. The only change was a lower nitrate reading. 

Ammonia: 0
Nitrite: 0
Nitrates: 10
Temp :80 F (I know a bit high, but I had it this way for 2 month with no issues
PH 7.5
GH and KH prob off the roof as it's LA water. 

I assume something happened with the addition of the Seachem Matrix/Phosgate but I thought it would be safe for shrimps. Any idea what went wrong in the tank? The endlers are doing fine.


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## nel (Jan 23, 2016)

You mean phosguard? It has to be rinsed before adding (it creates heat at first) and you have to make sure it won't tumble, if it will, it can cause a disaster. Maybe that's the case?


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## AVN (Oct 3, 2012)

It could be possible that the sudden change in PPM shocked all your shrimp. They aren't the hardiest of creatures, and in my experience with keeping them, sometimes even a large temperature difference is enough to kill a bunch off.

I wouldn't be so quick to chalk it up to the products you put into the tank though, but it's likely that there was enough of a difference between the tank water and the water you introduced to stress out your shrimp.

Bump: I've been out of it for a while so pardon me if I'm wrong, but wasn't the optimal temperature range for shrimp around 70-72F? I know they can tolerate much colder and warmer conditions, but that may also be a factor in it. If your tank is regularly warm, and you introduce a large amount of cold water, you will fluctuate the temperature inside the tank and that causes stress in the animals.

Did you clean your filter media with tank water or tap water? It's possible you also killed beneficial bacteria if you used chlorinated tap.


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## TheLordOfTheFish (Mar 11, 2017)

I did rinse the phosguard but dosed way more than needed for 3 gallon after looking at the bag. It's possible it was tumbling too. Seachem matrix however should be totally safe, right? I took phosguard out and will monitor the tank for a week and then give this another try.
@AVN: I clean the filter media with the fishtankw ater, not tap water (been there done that, learned my lesson). Temperature could be the issue but I make sure to do raise the water change temperature to match what is in the tank. I disconnected my heater as the temp in my house stays around 72-77F. Should be fine without a heater then.


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## AVN (Oct 3, 2012)

Alright then we come back to the PPM problem. I personally have killed a few smaller tanks of shrimp doing exactly what you have. In the end I couldn't figure any other reasons out, so I blamed it on my misuse of gH and kH boosters. But I always dosed at 80% of what was recommended on the jar so there's that as well. There's also the off-chance that your shrimp got used to incredibly saturated water. and when it became too clean too quick it stressed them to death.

There's also something called a Nitrate Spike--quote from another forum

"Sometimes you can have a cycle started due to any shock. And in that process the increase in ammonia can cause a nitrite spike as the nitrite bacteria build up to create the nitrates. Just like in the initial cycle with no plants. but usually with established tanks those cycles are very small."

Possibly a large enough fluctuation in your nitrogen cycle because of the removal of filter bacteria to poison your tank.


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## Corydoradaxplora (Mar 31, 2017)

As AVN said there is a chance your shrimp got used to saturated water and the water being too clean too quick killed them. Phosphorus is part of TDS and if high and then stripped in a short amount of time it could have dropped your TDS drastically. This would lead to osmotic shock. It is much easier for shrimp to go from clean to dirty water than from dirty to clean. In dirty water exoskeleton cells hold more minerals and less water. When the water becomes cleaner, less minerals and more water. Unless this happens slowly and they get a chance to molt, thus regulating their exoskeleton, there is no where for that water to go and they can stress to death.


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