# 10 amano shrimp dead from KH/GH?



## Yukiharu (May 3, 2014)

I don't think they would die from high gH/kH in an hour, but your levels are double their recommended limit.


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## kevmo911 (Sep 24, 2010)

No idea about Amanos and hard water, but yes, Mg is one of the top two contributors to GH, the other being Ca. What's your tap GH/KH?


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## ursamajor (Oct 6, 2015)

I wonder if you have any heavy metals in your tap water? It sounds like the combination of evaporation and infrequent, small water changes has super-concentrated not just the magnesium you're dosing, but also anything in your tap water as well. For example, I think it is possible for copper to leach into your water...


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## RisingSun (Jan 5, 2014)

kevmo911 said:


> No idea about Amanos and hard water, but yes, Mg is one of the top two contributors to GH, the other being Ca. What's your tap GH/KH?


Tap KH = 7, GH = 6

Definitely does seem like some magnesium build up going on. I will stop dosing the mg. It's crazy that it went from 6 GH to 29 GH.

I was also dosing csm+b according to this dose: Newbie Guide to PPS-Pro - PPS Analysis and Feedback - Aquatic Plant Central, which is about 0.002 ppm of copper per day according to Yet Another Nutrient Calculator. Lowest level of copper causing problems I found was here: its the stupid things that get ya... - Aquarium Plants - Barr Report at 0.02 ppm copper. CSM+B is chelated, but if it weren't, I'd get copper poisoning after 10 doses (assuming no plant uptake). I think the APC scaled the CSM+B up to satisfy iron levels, causing other traces to be higher than ideal. I think going forward I'm going to mix csm+bTPA iron at 3:2 as suggested by some other posts. According to water reports, the range in my area is "non-detectable - 0.8ppm". 90th percentile was .5ppm copper. I ordered the seachem copper test just in case, but I doubt it can detect down to 0.02 ppm of copper.


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## RisingSun (Jan 5, 2014)

Tested copper using the seachem test kit. Tank water is completely clear, so if there is copper it's undetectable by the kit. Tap water has the tiniest tint of blue if I squint really hard (maybe .01 ppm?). I do run activated carbon and prime which both remove metals.


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## Daisy Mae (Jun 21, 2015)

I think your water changes need to be larger and more frequent- that's a significant amount of TDS creep going on there (even just using the GH numbers and not accounting for what's not measured by the GH, your TDS has gone from approx 100 in the tap water to approx 500). 

Basically, the WCs and the top-offs are not compensating for the stuff that is being added to the tank and the water loss from evaporation.

Depending on what the LFS water parameters are, it could have been too much for the shrimp to handle if they were already stressed from other factors. Even with the long acclimation. Especially if they were adults.


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## RisingSun (Jan 5, 2014)

Just measured the TDS - 1310
After 30% water change - 1160
Tap water - 253

I'm guessing my ultra high TDS/GH/KH killed the shrimp? My fish (espei rasbora, otos, bristlenose, cardinal tetra) all seem happy.

Surprisingly my GH only dropped by 1 after the water change even though the tap has much less GH.


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## JustJen (Jun 20, 2011)

My GH is no where near as high as yours was (9), but my kh is 19. Those measurements are out of the tap, I honestly don't know what they are in the tanks as I haven't checked it in several years, but back when I did check it, it stayed withing 1 or 2 of those numbers. Anyway, I've had this same batch of 15 amanos (across 3 tanks) for well over a year, and haven't had a single death. Their shipment was delayed a day so they showed up on a day that I didn't have any choice but to float the bag for a few minutes and dump them so I could get back to the office - so they didn't even have the benefit of a decent acclimation. Maybe GH is more harmful to them than KH, but especially knowing they died in such a short period of time, I can't imagine that's what killed them. I can't keep cardinals for instance in my water due to the high ph/kh (I've been told the kh is actually the piece that is more problematic for them - their kidneys aren't equipped to deal with the extra calcium in the water), but they do fine initially, even coming from conditions that are much more ideal. They just fizzle out after 6-9 months in my tanks.


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## Oso Polar (Apr 22, 2015)

RisingSun said:


> tested my water and everything seems normal (ammonia - 0, nitrite - 0)


Check also your nitrate - with such a small water changes it is possible that its level is extremely high (e.g. 200 or more). Fish that are very slowly acclimated to such nitrate level may be fine but new ones can be shocked. Shrimp are more sensitive than fish.


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## bcbishop (Dec 7, 2013)

RisingSun said:


> Just measured the TDS - 1310
> After 30% water change - 1160
> Tap water - 253
> 
> ...


1310 TDS!?!?! Wow!
What substrate do you have? Any rocks in the tank?

http://www.theshrimpfarm.com/amano-shrimp.php


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## RisingSun (Jan 5, 2014)

Nitrates are around 16. I have eco complete and some seiryu stone in the tank

Just did 40% water chamge, I'm down to:
700 TDS
11kh
17gh


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