This article is aimed at people who wish to set up their first shrimp only aquarium for dwarf shrimp,

So where do we start?  Well lets lay out the different options that need to be examined when planning a shrimp aquarium, remember that this aquarium is going to be about the shrimp, anything else kept, including plants, is secondary to this.

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The Tank

This is always going to be the first piece of equipment to be considered, it’s the tank that is going to influence your choices in the rest of the planning.

Now dwarf shrimp can be kept comfortably in anything from 24 litres and up, but as you are most probably going to want to breed your shrimp, I would suggest something a little larger.  This gives you more room both for the initial stock (larger groups are better as too small a group will limit the gene pool for your offspring, leading to more inbreeding and possibly problems in the future.) and for any offspring.  Also the larger the volume of water the smaller the impact of any changes in water quality or temperature.  Shrimp need stability, in quality and temperature.

I will be blogging about The Fluval EBI Nano Shrimp Habitat shortly.

Filtration

As mentioned before, dwarf shrimp need stable conditions, they also need very high quality water, with absolutely NO ammonia or nitrites.  A sniff of ammonia or nitrite can decimate your shrimp very quickly.  As such the filtration used needs to be  mature, with no risk of ammonia or nitrite spikes.  It also needs to have a good surface area for the filter bacteria to colonise, the bigger the surface area to volume ratio the better.  However it also needs to be ‘gentle’ as to powerful a suck can lead to young shrimp being sucked in and possibly turned into shrimp paste.

Lighting

Bright lighting is not needed for keeping shrimp.  As such low to medium lighting is prefered.

Heater

You can use any that is rated for your volume of tank, ones with electronic thermostats are prefered as they are more accurate and less likely to cook your shrimp if anything goes wrong.  You can also keep shrimp without heaters if their tank is kept in a heated room where the temperature is kept pretty constant, although if using smaller tanks I advise that a heater is still used as insurance against temperature swings.

Substrate

Any dark to medium coloured substrate that does not have a sharp surface and is calcium free can be used.  Size wise .5-3mm grain sizes are good.  Lighter substrates are a bad idea as they tend to make shrimp nervous and lose their colour.

Plants

Live aquarium plants are VERY important when keeping shrimp.  They provide homes, hiding places and also a site where the shrimp can feed.  However avoid planting difficult, demanding or high light requiring plants, and instead chose plants that can tolerate lower lighting and don’t need lots of nutrients or CO2.  As such mosses are absolutely fantastic for shrimp, they provide lots of lovely places to hide and act as a good place for tiny algaes and bacteria to grow on, providing food for both adults and  shrimplets.  I also like to plant the front of my tanks with dwarf grass, my shrimp just love to explore in it and feed on any algae growing on it.

Decor

Wood is very good for shrimp tanks, especially bogwood that has been well soaked to reduce any impact on water quality.  Again it provides places for shrimp to hide and for algae and bacteria to grow.  It also looks really nice with mosses and java fern attached to it.  You can also use stones that do not contain calcium in shrimp tanks, but try to at least put a bit of wood in with them.

Shrimp Species

Now you have your tank set up and matured, it’s time to add your shrimp (mature your aquarium and filter, you can use eco-complete for a ready matured substrate and use biological media from an already matured filter or the many safe start products for instant cycling).  So which ones do you chose?  Well in the UK usually the most readily available, hardy, and easy to keep shrimp are the Cherry Shrimp

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