Lost a cleaner shrimp today…

[Surfnskate]

My Son and I are pretty new to reefing. We have a Fluval Evo 13.5 with 2 clowns, a few blueleg crabs, (had a shrimp for about 2-3 months), and a couple corals.

We did a 10% water change last night with pre-mixed red-sea water and a little RO…

I’ve noticed a few changes in the tank the last few days…

Blue leg Crabs have been way less active and it’s hard to tell if all 7 are around because we also have some spare shells around…

The ricordea frag we have that is usually fully expanded to the plug size has been pretty closed up. The small hammer, and other mushroom seems happy…

Lastly, there are all these little grey tube-looking things on the sand and surfaces of rock (they look potentially like bits of molt from crab legs or some kind of poo? Not sure - I don’t think they are anything living.

Anyway, i used an eyedropper to blast some of it off the rock in hopes that it would get sucked into the filter last night after the water change.

This AM we found our cleaner shrimp dead (looked like mid molt - he’s molted 2 times in the past 2-3 months).

Only thing I can think of is that maybe he wasn’t getting enough to eat due to our clowns going crazy at feeding time.

Any thoughts?

 

[LordofCinder]

How is the flow in the tank? How is the gas exchange? What do you feed to the tank and how often?

if you can list all your water parameters that will help. A pic of the tank will help a lot too.

 

[Sharkbait19]

Grey tubes sounds like snail and crab poop.
As for the shrimp, I agree params would help a lot. Do you use RO water?

 

[AtlantiCat]

Shrimp can get stuck in the middle of a molt and die that way if they can't get the old exoskeleton removed completely . Sometimes it's due to a lack of available calcium, but sometimes it just happens for no apparent reason. Check your parameters?

 

[Bennett_Reefing]

My Son and I are pretty new to reefing. We have a Fluval Evo 13.5 with 2 clowns, a few blueleg crabs, (had a shrimp for about 2-3 months), and a couple corals.

We did a 10% water change last night with pre-mixed red-sea water and a little RO…

I’ve noticed a few changes in the tank the last few days…

Blue leg Crabs have been way less active and it’s hard to tell if all 7 are around because we also have some spare shells around…

The ricordea frag we have that is usually fully expanded to the plug size has been pretty closed up. The small hammer, and other mushroom seems happy…

Lastly, there are all these little grey tube-looking things on the sand and surfaces of rock (they look potentially like bits of molt from crab legs or some kind of poo? Not sure - I don’t think they are anything living.

Anyway, i used an eyedropper to blast some of it off the rock in hopes that it would get sucked into the filter last night after the water change.

This AM we found our cleaner shrimp dead (looked like mid molt - he’s molted 2 times in the past 2-3 months).

Only thing I can think of is that maybe he wasn’t getting enough to eat due to our clowns going crazy at feeding time.

Any thoughts?

Did you use any copper-based algae killer? It's horrible for invertebrates.

 

[JTP424]

As mentioned by @AtlantiCat Shrimp and crabs (I.E. Inverts in general) can die if you happen to due a water change during their molt and the parameters between your tank water and the new water is significantly different. They can be inversely impacted by salinity changes too.

 

[Surfnskate]

Did you use any copper-based algae killer? It's horrible for invertebrates.

No - nothing like that.. only thing I’ve ever used is DR. Tims Nitrifying Bacteria…

 

[Surfnskate]

As mentioned by @AtlantiCat Shrimp and crabs (I.E. Inverts in general) can die if you happen to due a water change during their molt and the parameters between your tank water and the new water is significantly different. They can be inversely impacted by salinity changes too.

Yea, unfortunately I think this is what happened…

 

[Surfnskate]

Shrimp can get stuck in the middle of a molt and die that way if they can't get the old exoskeleton removed completely . Sometimes it's due to a lack of available calcium, but sometimes it just happens for no apparent reason. Check your parameters?

Yes params are good - I will add to the original post. I think he just got stuck unfortunately… thank for the input…

 

[Wamland]

How’s your salinity ?

 

[Surfnskate]

Grey tubes sounds like snail and crab poop.
As for the shrimp, I agree params would help a lot. Do you use RO water?

Thanks - thought it might be poop… Yes Premixed red sea for Salt, and RO for fresh…

 

[Surfnskate]

How’s your salinity ?

Salinity is 34ppm

 

[Surfnskate]

How is the flow in the tank? How is the gas exchange? What do you feed to the tank and how often?

if you can list all your water parameters that will help. A pic of the tank will help a lot too.

Flow is pretty good - plenty of gas exchange… feed thera A+

Params are:

77.5 degrees,
34ppm salinity,
7.9 ph,
0 ammonia,
0 nitrite,
Maybe 1ppm nitrate,

Just did a 10% water change.

On the bright side the Ricordea looks better

 

[Sharkbait19]

Do you know calcium or phosphate? Both can cause problems with molting if not at proper levels (calc too low and phos too high).

 

[Surfnskate]

Do you know calcium or phosphate? Both can cause problems with molting if not at proper levels (calc too low and phos too high).

Oh ok, yes - I’ll check them asap!