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Re: Keeping C. japonica...Alive :)



In a message dated 7/31/99 1:07:42 AM Pacific Daylight Time, 
Aquatic-Plants-Owner at actwin_com writes:

<< Just thought that I had to bring up all the negatives on these $%$ shrimp. 
 
 I'm sure that ymmv.  I have tried them twice.  My tank parameters are:  pH 
 4.5, temp 82F, no other problems. >>

Hehe. Believe it or not, 4.5 is about the pH of beer. And 82 F is a little 
warm even for most tropical fish. C. japonica are cultivated in Japanese 
marshes where temperatures stay pretty cool. 

<< Don't know, they never lived long enough for me see a difference.  I had 
20 
 in a 125 gallon, and in one week, they were gone.  I had 8 in a 15 gallon 
and 
 in two weeks, they were dead. >>

Rich, I'm not surprised your shrimp died. That was sorta blunt huh? As with 
any aquatic plant or fish, certain parameters need to be met by the aquarist 
in order to keep C. japonica comfortable...or at least alive. For those of 
you who want to try these awesome little algae eaters, I've prepared a little 
mini-faq from tidbits I cut and pasted from 
http://www.thekrib.com/Fish/shrimp.html#19Ryan. Good luck in all you shrimpy 
endeavors.

C. japonica are very tolerant when it come to water types. Since they come 
from swamps they can also tolerate different salinity's. And since C. 
japonica originates from a swampy/marsh region with brackish conditions I 
would guess that a pH well above 7 is also fine. In contrast, they tend to 
die at a pH under 6. They are not tropical and die when the temp gets over 
30C. A temperature between 15-28C is optimal. Shrimps are more sensitive to 
excess CO2 than fish. ADA recommends observing them to determine whether CO2 
is adversely affecting your shrimp. (They are usually busy picking things up 
to their mouth.  When CO2 levels become excessively high, they become dull or 
stop moving the arms.)  They often carry eggs, but are hard to reproduce in 
most planted tanks since they need brackish water for breeding. Two thing to 
point out is that Yamato numa-ebi are very sensitive to ammonia/ammonium, and 
heavy metals. Heavy metals will interfere with their molting process and 
cause them to die.  Ammonia and ammonium are just poisonous to all living 
thing. Other than these simple rule C. japonica require no other special 
needs.

<< I'm not bitter though.......just wiser. >>

I hope now, your even wiser...

Finally, if any of you are interested in breeding C. japonica, e-mail me 
off-list and I'll send you some sites with a lot of useful information.

Dan P