# Ghost shrimp care?



## Sea Dragon (Mar 20, 2012)

So I have the ones with the orange tail dots that are considered compatible with docile bettas, and seeing as how popular they are, I thought the care sheets I found online for them would be more than "They eat detritus"  

So I have a few [a lot] questions:
1. Do ghost shrimp eat diatoms? I found some darkish mass in her digestive tract and that's either my driftwood, diatoms, or my still dying bacopa.
2. If so, can I rely on them to get their plant nutrition from the dead leaves/algae in my tank or should I supplement with wafers/fresh veggies for maximum shrimp happiness? Which veggies would you recommend? (I already supplement her with my omega pellets for animal protein)
3. Do they eat detritus worms?
4. What about baby pond snails/snail eggs?
5. The girl I got has been clinging to her eggs for four days now. Is she going to eat those eventually?
6. I want to get two more shrimpies. Is there a recommended gender ratio like guppies? Not that I want to breed them or anything, I just don't want two males hounding down my female constantly.


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## bniebetta (Feb 26, 2013)

I don't have any answers, and that is precisely why I am attaching myself to this post. I just got some shrimp.


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## Sea Dragon (Mar 20, 2012)

Weird, but cool aren't they


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## bniebetta (Feb 26, 2013)

yeah! haha


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## SunshineSulie (Mar 16, 2013)

I am no expert, but I had ghost shrimp for about 3 months before someone killed them... *sigh*

I just gave them fish flakes and broke TINY pieces of these Algae Wafers off. What finally killed them was when a friend of mine thought she would help and put an entire wafer in there... *sad*


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## NeptunesMom (May 4, 2012)

Why did the whole wafer kill them? I just bought 3 little ghosties last night. They are in a tank by themselves with the snails. I feel the snails cucumber and lettuce. That won't hurt them will it?


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## Laki (Aug 24, 2011)

I'm just going to input my experience. Anyone with more experience can come in any time and refute what I am about to say... 

From my research, ghost shrimp are extremely sensitive to water parameters and were typically bred not to last long- more bred as food for other species. I don't know how true this is since they're so hard to see! lol I bought 3 ghost shrimp last year sometime and they all died overnight. I know, in hindsight, it was my water and everything was new and not cycled or anything. But I vowed to never again own shrimp (because the spikes in water params overnight ended up killing my VT Lakitu). 

So, I would ONLY add ghost shrimp to carefully monitered water. 

Now, I will answer your questions but with my experience with red cherry shrimp (another dwarf shrimp but which were bred to be more hardy because they were bred to be pets and to withstand a wider scale of water params):

1. Do ghost shrimp eat diatoms? I found some darkish mass in her digestive tract and that's either my driftwood, diatoms, or my still dying bacopa. Shrimp scavenge for anything. I have seen mine sift through their poop looking for food. Diatoms are just decomposing waste/plant matter right?? If so, I have seen mine going through it
2. If so, can I rely on them to get their plant nutrition from the dead leaves/algae in my tank or should I supplement with wafers/fresh veggies for maximum shrimp happiness? Which veggies would you recommend? (I already supplement her with my omega pellets for animal protein) In my shrimp-only tank I supplement with algae wafers, they LOVE it!! They fight over it and just kick it all over the place. I have 11-12 RCS and they all do fine on like 1/4 of an algae wafer once or twice a week. They poop a lot so they don't need too much supplement food. I watched my shrimp eat the stuff off the roots of floating salvinia and marimo moss. They love picking through live plants and this is generally a fine diet. Some people I read about while researching getting shrimp said they don't even feed their shrimp in a live planted tank. And I just moved 2 adult RCS into my betta tank, I have NO intentions of giving them algae wafers bc I have an abundance of algae- their favorite food. Plus my bettas would eat the algae wafer. 
3. Do they eat detritus worms? No. I had my shrimp eating frozen bloodworms but they don't hunt to the best of my knowledge. They prefer to graze on stuff laying around.
4. What about baby pond snails/snail eggs? Shrimp wwon't bother snails or eggs that I know of.
5. The girl I got has been clinging to her eggs for four days now. Is she going to eat those eventually? Your shrimp? They keep their eggs on their underbellies for like a month, in which time the eggs grow and mature. When they hatch, mom kicks them into the water randomly. She keeps the eggs on her for a day or so afterwards I think. Baby shrimp will eat the infusoria in live plants like its going out of style.
6. I want to get two more shrimpies. Is there a recommended gender ratio like guppies? Not that I want to breed them or anything, I just don't want two males hounding down my female constantly. I have 11 or 12 RCS of random gender in my tank, as long as parameters are stable and they have plenty of food they will just breed on their own. You can see fertilized females by the "saddle" on their backs. This means they have already been fertilized.


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## Laki (Aug 24, 2011)

The whole wafer killed them because food laying around in a tank causes a rise in ammonia the longer it sets. Ghost shrimp are particularly senstive to ammonia. They died because of that. You have to try not to overffeed them.


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## SunshineSulie (Mar 16, 2013)

Laki is exactly right. They died because the water got dirty and the ammonia went crazy. They seemed to be hearty animals (got mine from pet smart) though they did get territorial and try to kill each other in the beginning. They also loved fish flakes as supplements (plus you can see the red/yellow/green go through them which was kinda nice). My shrimp liked spinach. Didn't try anything else. Hope that helped a little.


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## NeptunesMom (May 4, 2012)

Hmm.. Well, maybe mine have died. I have not seen them since last night. I am not going to waste a test on that tank because I know the snails are all fine (I see them all eating cucumbers). My water is super murky because I have a cuttle bone in it for the snails. We shall see if they surface or not, if they died I guess the snails can eat them. I figured I would try to give them a good home, and if they died at least I tried and they didn't die fighting off big fish. 

The only things I have are 4 mystery snails and a bunch of pond snails in a 10 g. I did about a 20% water change last night after adding the shrimp. The tank does run high in nitrates, ammonia and nitrites because of the snails.


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## Laki (Aug 24, 2011)

I'd say the snails caused the shrimp to die  Unfortunately mystery snails and pond are among the highest bioload in terms of snails. And if the water was murky from cuttlebone plus cucumber.


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## NeptunesMom (May 4, 2012)

Is it okay to leave their bodies in there (that sounds so sad ) or should I try to fish them out for the health of the snails? I know snails eat dead and decaying fish, shrimp are the same right? Okay... so I feel really super bad now. I looked up all about their care, but did not find anything about the water parameters. I figured they were hardier.

ETA: Sorry about kinda hijacking the threat here. This is my last question I promise.


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## Laki (Aug 24, 2011)

Ghost shrimp are not hardy at all. I thought that too when I bought mine. Red Cherry Shrimp and Amano Shrimp make better pets and are actually a lot hardier. 

Anything dead in the tank will raise the ammonia and nitrite. If you want to leave the bodies in for the snails (I wouldn't) then you'll have to change at least half the water today and then again in a day or so.


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## NeptunesMom (May 4, 2012)

Okay thanks. I just have no idea where they could possibly be. I can not even see to the back of the tank since putting that cuttle bone in there. On top of that, I have a ton of places for them to hide in plants and rock caves, etc.. they could've easily gone anywhere to hide and die.


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## Sea Dragon (Mar 20, 2012)

Aww I'm sorry about your shrimp  And I guess it's generally frowned upon but I don't mind if people use my thread to ask questions lol.

Thanks for the info Laki! My shrimp are fortunately doing well. I decided to just have two for my tank and my new girl enjoys chasing them for short distances. I'm confident they'll be fine however since it's a NPT with plenty of hiding places.


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## Laki (Aug 24, 2011)

Yay! I'm glad


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## NeptunesMom (May 4, 2012)

Sea Dragon said:


> Aww I'm sorry about your shrimp  And I guess it's generally frowned upon but I don't mind if people use my thread to ask questions lol.
> 
> Thanks for the info Laki! My shrimp are fortunately doing well. I decided to just have two for my tank and my new girl enjoys chasing them for short distances. I'm confident they'll be fine however since it's a NPT with plenty of hiding places.


Thanks! I don't typically hijack threads. I also don't mind if people do it to mine, just as long as it's still on topic. I'm glad yours are doing good. Maybe I'll get lucky and when I clean the tank tonight, I'll find them hiding somewhere alive. I had one little one last night swimming laps, but he/she quit once I cleaned the tank. I never saw them again.


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## Sea Dragon (Mar 20, 2012)

NeptunesMom said:


> Thanks! I don't typically hijack threads. I also don't mind if people do it to mine, just as long as it's still on topic. I'm glad yours are doing good. Maybe I'll get lucky and when I clean the tank tonight, I'll find them hiding somewhere alive. I had one little one last night swimming laps, but he/she quit once I cleaned the tank. I never saw them again.


Unless you find their bodies, I think theres still a hope they're alive since shrimp are experts at hiding 

Of course, the place you found them at may also be a factor. Some stores sell them as pets rather than feeders and they tend to take care of them better, like at my local Petco where they keep a few shrimp in 5-10 gallons of water with tannins and peaceful nerites/neons


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## Laki (Aug 24, 2011)

Actually, you wanna talk about expert hiders? I just put 2 of my RCS in the betta tank last night and I couldn't find them today but no evidence they were dead. I saw one once for like a minute just a few hours ago.


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## Artemis (Mar 9, 2013)

*DO NOT LISTEN TO THAT*

1. Do ghost shrimp eat diatoms? I found some darkish mass in her digestive tract and that's either my driftwood, diatoms, or my still dying bacopa.
_Mine go absolutely INSANE for betta pellets_
2. If so, can I rely on them to get their plant nutrition from the dead leaves/algae in my tank or should I supplement with wafers/fresh veggies for maximum shrimp happiness? Which veggies would you recommend? (I already supplement her with my omega pellets for animal protein)
_I try to supplement with some bits and pieces of Hikari Bottom Feeder Wafers and they like it some but they prefer the pellets. My juvi eats only algae though._
3. Do they eat detritus worms?
_No, they don't mess with live food very much_
4. What about baby pond snails/snail eggs?
_No. Eggs is possible but not likely_
5. The girl I got has been clinging to her eggs for four days now. Is she going to eat those eventually?
_No. They hold eggs for around 3-4 weeks. If they are green, she has a while to go. Once they become clear with little black dots (eyes) they have about 5 days left until they hatch._
6. I want to get two more shrimpies. Is there a recommended gender ratio like guppies? Not that I want to breed them or anything, I just don't want two males hounding down my female constantly.
_No. They are fine with a mix. The females collect eggs and will only release and then grab onto them if they are ready. No need to worry or strain yourself with trying to sex them _


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## Laki (Aug 24, 2011)

It's actually extremely easy to sex them. Females are larger and have an extended "cage" for keeping the eggs. Also, she can be spotted by her "saddle" which are fertilized eggs but like, microscopic. Males are smaller and have a sleeker appearance around the belly bc they don't have the "cage"


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## NeptunesMom (May 4, 2012)

I found one, and (in a Dr. Frankenstein voice) it's ALIVE!! . I am going to pick up some anacharis. It does such a good job of "cleaning" water. 

Are RCS more hardy? I am not going to lie to myself. I know my snail tank is not going to be the cleanest of my tanks. It's not going to be gross (it gets twice weekly water changes, at about 20-50% depending on how it looks), but I don't have time to keep it perfect for a something sensitive. Now, that I know at least one is alive I will try my best to keep it habitable for them.


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## Laki (Aug 24, 2011)

Yes, they're more hardy but are still susceptible to crappy water. I wouldn't add shrimp to a snail tank just to be safe.


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