TL;DR: Problems with algae? Turn down lighting intensity Sometimes there is wisdom online if you know where to find it and then actually listen to it. Clive at UKAPS for example advises against the “photon cannon” approach of blasting your aquarium with too much light. Too much light causes problematic algae. Lately I haven’t been […]
Read more →Category: Shrimphaus
Low-tech shrimp+snails aquarium; no CO2 injection; project-specific notes, observations, and maintenance.
It perhaps will not come as a big surprise that the hobby sometimes ascribes common names incorrectly to species names. Tangerine Tiger shrimp are a case in point. Tangerine Tiger shrimp are almost universally described in the hobby as Caridina serrata, but actually they are Caridina cantonensis (much more on that below). Does it matter […]
Read more →It is a struggle to find plants that can thrive in the Shrimphaus. The combination of low-KH high-GH “low tech” not-CO2 injected water seems to make things difficult. I recently gave up on the reputedly “easy” Staurogyne Repens. Still, lots of plants left to try. This time we’re having a go with another “easy” plant: […]
Read more →I thought the Blue Velvet neocaridina shrimp had all died off, but then suddenly, babies! There are at least 5 new little guys in the Shrimphaus. I have no idea where they came from – there is no sign of their parents. I gave them some protein flakes and they seem to be enjoying those. […]
Read more →I recently put some Rotala rotundifolia ‘Blood Red’ into the Fireplace Aquarium and it came in more of a burnt ochre shade of dusky reddish orange than ‘blood red’ as such. I looked around for the (potentially mythic) ‘Singapore’ (SG) variant of the Rotala which is claimed to be more red under a broader set […]
Read more →Here is a new baby Blue Velvet neocaridina shrimp in the shrimphaus. A berried Tangerine Tiger caridina shrimp does its thing on the left side with a pure red line caridina watching on. The zoom out at the end shows the scale. I thought the Blue Velvets were not doing well, but there are at […]
Read more →The Shrimphaus gets some light brown coloured algae-like material growing on the glass which needs periodic scraping off. It won’t just rub off casually, but it comes off using a credit card blank relatively easily. It does seem to happen more in regions of higher lighting. It isn’t super unsightly, and doesn’t happen fast enough […]
Read more →I wanted to get some different colour shrimp to help liven up the Shrimphaus but it’s not good to mix different colour morphs of the same species as the offspring will eventually wind up as wild-type colouration. Shrimphaus already has two different morphs of Caridina cantonensis shrimp: pure red line (PRL) and more generic crystal […]
Read more →With the caridina shrimp I’m trying to keep the KH around 30 ppm CaCO3 (about 1.7 dKH) by pre-treating Cambridgeshire tap water with a suitable amount of hydrochloric acid (HCl). The problem is the old aquasoil has been resisting the new water chemistry. The other problem is the aquasoil is brown/black and the slate is […]
Read more →Staurogyne repens is an ‘easy to grow’ and popular aquatic plant. I have been resisting trying this plant for some reason… too easy, too popular? Anyway, it has a low growth habit but isn’t a carpeting plant, so seems like it might be right for the Shrimphaus. I usually prefer potted plants, but at the […]
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