# What controls red cherry shrimp numbers?



## PickieBee (Oct 29, 2014)

I thought my fish would eat up all the baby shrimp but the red cherry shrimp are breeding like crazy in my community tank. I'm concerned that they will hide in the plants so I won't know how many I have and may increase the bioload too much. What keeps these shrimp from breeding out of control?


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## Dead2fall (Jun 4, 2014)

Send some to me that'll fix it! Haha


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## theatermusic87 (Jun 22, 2014)

You can limit feeding them directly, or you can not feed entirely and just let them scavenge in the tank. However you don't really need to be too concerned with the bioload from shrimp as it is usually really low. Case in point there are probably 100 shrimp in my 5g tank thats moderately planted and I consistently test 0 nitrates


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## ahem (Dec 27, 2014)

At some point there's simply too many of them that can't all be hiding at once and they are easy pickings for the fish. I'm guessing you'll reach some equilibrium that isn't over-population. I never feed mine and the colony size is stable. There's plenty of algae and dropped food, plus I put in veggies for the whole community from time to time.


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## Clayman (Jan 7, 2015)

I keep cherry shrimp in a 10g with a pair of peacock gudgeons. I only feed the gudgeons and any leftover food the shrimps eat. I don't feed the shrimp and the colony has grown well without. I dont know how many shrimplets the gudgeons eat, but they do t mess with the adult shrimp at all.


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## newbieshrimpkeeper (Dec 2, 2014)

Maybe Sixray cories? the arent true cories(part of the false cories- aptly named), but are kinda cool, good community fish and may dig up(?) hiding shrimplets to eat, also they are small, so unlikely to attack adults. Also panda cories are good, but may harm adults. Or maybe freshwater bumblebee gobies.


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## PickieBee (Oct 29, 2014)

newbieshrimpkeeper said:


> Or maybe freshwater bumblebee gobies.


 I would LOVE to have some of those, if only I could find them!


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## DasKnocker (Feb 11, 2015)

Clayman, I'm so jealous! I tried transplanting ten RCS from my 13 and 5 into my 11 long with Badis Badis and Peacock G(r)udgeons and the Peacocks made quick work of them (adults and juviies). I normally feed daphnia, maybe they needed something a bit meatier in their diet! 

PickieBee, I estimate I have between 40 and 60 in my Fluval V with some Dario Dario and Badis Badis fry, and there's absolutely no problems with bioload. The Dario are great for fresh-out-of-the-egg shrimp, but anything larger they don't bother with. I still see mild growth and sustainment of the colony.


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## ahem (Dec 27, 2014)

I don't feed mine, they get plenty of algae and food that drops and have been proliferating. I would guess they will not outbreed the tank. If you have any fish, at some number of RCS, the babies become really easy to snap up since there are so many of them, so it would seem the number should approach some upper bound but not go over.


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