I think my bamboo shrimp is dying! Can I save him?

A

Aegla Wish

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Feb 6, 2012
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He is bright red like the color when other ones died the first time I tried them. I fixed my water levels and tried again and he had been doing really well for like at least two weeks, even though the other one I got died. I put a little fertilizer in today for the first time since I got him, and tonight he was swimming funny, trying to get up higher and laying on his side.

I did a partial water change, added some conditioner that helps with amonia, nitrites and nitrates, and I changed my carbon filters, just in case it was from some sort of mineral or metal. I put him in a net up high under a filter outlet and near where the bubbles from my bar break the surface hoping he will get more air. My green, cherry shrimp, and vampire shrimp all seem fine, with some little babies shown up in my dwarf shrimp breeding box. The bamboos have always been sensitive for me.

I really don't want him to die. :(
 
I agree, the color you describe is just maturity. Mine thrived and looked just like that, but he didn't last long for me either, less than a year. I know he was getting plenty to eat, he ate Ken's veggie pellets, nori and algae wafers. He spent lots of time by the filter, just as he should, fanning for food. One day he just up and died...
 
He died. It was like a lobster red, his strip had disapeared, before he was more of a brick red.. I'm really sad. I don't think that I'll get anymore.
 
Bamboo shrimp only live one to two years. They are wild caught for the most part so you don't know how old they are to start with. I would try getting the smallest you can find that is eating well. The other thing is where you got them. A lot of stores clean their tanks well so there isn't enough food for them to survive. And most places don't know how to feed them anyways and put them in an unestablished tank and they starve. They have an exoskeleton so it isn't like you can tell they are skinny. When you get one make sure he has a perch in the filter stream and give him a tiny pinch of First Bites which is a fry food you can buy. Add it to the water once a day upstream from where he sits and he will love getting yummy nibbles without much work. :)
 
That's why I was asking what you were feeding him and how big your tank was......if the tank is large and established, there might be enough for a filter feeder to eat without adding a whole lot, but most of the time, a couple times a week, add some kind of algae for filter feeders type food. I have even added Phytoplankton into my tanks before, the shrimp would just sit high on a branch and eat. He lasted quite a while.
 
My tank is large and well established. Like a 45 gallon and my vampire shrimp do just fine. I've only had trouble with the bamboo. I fed him powdered flakes he would catch and he would filter over the algea pellets I drop in. He was pretty big though. A large male. My females and smaller ones always died too. I don't know that people have as much success with them around here that I have heard. Our water is really hard as it is, and the rest of my stock doesn't mind it. He did really quite well before he died, standing up on the spawning mop by in the current, or at the top of drift wood.

I think I some point I may try again and do some different things, But I'll probably take a break for a bit. My vampires are happy though. Dark little hidey things. :)
 
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