The other possibility is to use a much larger shrimp. About the biggest commonly available FW aquarium shrimp would be Atyopsis Moluccensis, they get to I think around 3" long for females, 4" for males if I remember correctly. They are a bit less interesting to watch (as in they dont often move about), and around here much more expensive (like $12 or something like that at Petsmart). I tried two females with my loaches (biggest one is a 5" clown), one I stopped seeing a few months back and the other I havent seen in about a month. Its quite possible they have been killed, but I havent found there remains (not that I have thoroughly looked). I say possible because they do tend to hide sometimes, mostly after molting, but I dont think they usually vanish for that long. Remember even if the shrimp is actually larger than the loach, they can still harass it enough to kill it and or bit there legs off, etc. Chances are it wont work out.
