Ghost shrimp going opaque

[corykitty]

I'm removing my ghosts from my tank but I still want to figure out why this is happening.

They're just gradually turning white, like solid white, and I don't know why. I looked at their foods, none of them have copper listed in them. I do dose my tank with Flourish but I don't even do close to a full dose.

Their foods include a sinking catfish pellet, a sinking omnivore pellet, seaweed, bloodworms, and brine shrimp so it's a pretty varied diet.

Basic tank parameters:
Size: 5.5 gallon
Filtration: appx 40 GPH, carbon pouch inside
Temp: 78 degrees
Ammonia, nitrite: 0ppm
Nitrate: Haven't tested lately but it's probably zero
Water treated with Prime
Dosed with 1/2 dose of Flourish once a week, dosed with 1/5 dose of API Carbon Boost 3 or 4 times a week

I've had two deaths in a month. They're all still energetic but one by one, they've turned white and I assume they're going to die. I put them into a smaller tank with my betta for now until I decide what to do with them - probably going to just let them live out their time till they die or cull them, I wouldn't give them away because I don't know what's wrong with them and I wouldn't want to hurt anyone else's animals by them being feeders.

I've heard that ghosts can be hard to keep alive long term, but since I'm switching over to cherries now, I want to see if anyone thinks there's anything I'm doing wrong before I put in the more expensive guys. Do I need to start using store bought filtered water or something? I don't mind doing that since my tank is small and it's getting well established and stable so it wouldn't require much in the way of changing too often.

[mnemenoi]

I think your fine, ghosts are really tricky and need a very seasoned tank, I'd honestly recommend 6 months to a year on very small tanks. Picos can be tough on sensitive stuff, ghost shrimp are much harder then cherries in my opinion. We dose Flourish and Excel at full strength, it has never bothered them. My guess is some quick swing you might be missing in that small of a tank. The bacteria load could be small still and 30 minutes after feeding see an Ammonia swing to .25, which is gone after 2 hours. Though I can't be sure, I am betting its something like that. It will just take some time to figure out. Once you have the cherries down, try one or two again and see if they do better.

[corykitty]

I guess my tank is cursed because 15 of my 20 cherries died within 2 days. The ghosts survived a move to a dirty little betta tank for those two days (every single one) and I just moved them back and they're being their normal selves. I'm guessing I got a bad batch of cherries, I'll try again once my flame moss takes off. Sigh. Cash down the drain on these cherries but maybe I can figure it out. I put a pouch of Purigen in in case that might help them survive. If those last 5 can live, maybe they can reproduce and I'll still have a chance yet.

[rmalford]

Sure they are ghost shrimp? River prawns are often sold as ghost and they are murderers. They will kill cherries.

[corykitty]

The ghost shrimp weren't in the same tank with the cherries when they died; I had moved the ghosts to my betta tank. But I moved them back after most of the cherries were dead (I wanted the ghosts to be in there to eat the bodies, honestly, because I don't think I'll have any survivors) and one ghost was dead this morning. There's obviously something in the water that wasn't in the betta tank. I had recently changed the main tank's water so I have to assume there was something in my tap water for that change that isn't usually there. :/ My fish are all still okay for now, luckily, and of course all the plants are healthy which is good. I'm just gonna change out the water gradually with something store bought to hopefully clear out whatever is in the water killing inverts and I'll try again with cherries in a while.

[corykitty]

So I had one more death, one of the larger ghosts that was solid opaque. I noticed its meat was bulging out of its back. I'm not sure whether to attribute that to decay and scavenging or a molting issue. I'm struggling with how to feed them appropriately since there's also the corycats, which need a good meaty diet, and the gobies which I have NO idea what they need but they seem to be doing well, and the shrimp which need a very light, plant-y diet. Any suggestions? I'm considering just getting another 5 gallon tank for growing shrimps and nothing else because I can't bear to get rid of my corycats, I love them too much.

Luckily, i still have at least 6 cherry survivors. 3 are hiding, which isn't necessarily a good sign, but 3 are always out and active. Hoping I can keep these alive and eventually once the water is cleared out of whatever might have killed the shrimpers, I'll definitely buy some again. And one day, crystal reds but that'll be in a different tank. :)

[corykitty]

Just wanted to update on this. Since I put in the Purigen, everything seems better. I think maybe it was a case of small, sudden ammonia spikes and the Purigen helped control that. The six shrimp have survived (I think, I haven't found bodies anyway) and I added 5 more from the local Petco (they are super low quality compared to the ones I bought but that's okay) and they all seem to be alive and thriving too. I really need to do some plant trimming and moving, but I hate to do that right now since the shrimp are settling in. I moved the ghost shrimp back to the betta tank (all but two of the smallest ones which I kept because they're such excellent scavengers, especially if I do have a shrimp death, they can take those bodies down in no time).