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A second try.....
Well, my first post drew no replies, so I'll talk about something else.
I wanted to make a suggestion to those folks who are having difficulty
keeping "anything with an exoskeleton". The only ghost shrimp I ever
kept other than feeders lived for what seemed to be an eternity (it was
in my first tank back in 1981), becuase it out survived most everything
I put in the tank with it. In any case, it lead me to ponder why they
were suddenly so hard to keep, and immediately several things come to
mind. First, invertebrates are extremely sensitive to heavy metals. Even
small amounts of copper can do them in (at least it does in marine
tanks). Second, extremely soft water will kill them when they molt since
the minerals needed for exoskeleton developement would be in short
supply. I have also read that animals with exoskeletons experience an
extremely high mortality rate in times of molting. This is an
unavoidable fact, and anyone who raises tarantulas can tell you that it
is a definite reality. I have heard that the succesive molts get easier
as they go, but the early molts for most animals have a mortality over
50%. That's why they have hundreds (if not thousands) of young at a
time.
Just a thought....