First Casualty

Sad day this morning.

My newly added bloodshrimp only lasted a week in my tank. I found it this morning in its normal hiding spot being eaten by my serpent star. This is the first casualty I have had in my tank and it has been past cycle for about 3 months. My parameters are all normal and everything else seems to be ok. Could it have been stress that killed him or do you think my serpent star just got a little hungry and got lucky with the catch. any one have any ideas what killed my poor little shrimp?.

 

i have no idea, but sorry to hear about your shrimp.

 

sorry to hear about your loss Tbone.

To source the problem let's start with the basics:

You say your water params are fine but inverts are very sensitive to param shifts/ranges so posting exact parameters is very useful to diagnosing the problem.

Also, what is the size of the tank/sump you are talking about?

What is your temp?

Do you run a skimmer?

Have you added/moved anything recently?

Have you added/removed any livestock (corals, fish, inverts recently)?

Have you started dosing anything? Stopped dosing anything?

What else is in the tank?

 

parameters are as followed

ammonia 0
ph 8.2
Nitrites 0
Nitrates 0
Calcium 440
phosphate 0
KH 7
I even tested copper which is at 0. (I use RO from a filling station, I didn't think they would have copper, but you never know)

I have a 65g with daul drainage to 25g sump/refuge. I have 60 lbs of live rock and a 4 inch sandbed that consists of about 90 lbs of live sand. I have a coralife 120 skimmer and I do regular 20% water changes weekly.

Stocked in the tank are

a bunch of snails and hermits.
sally light foot crab
skunk cleaner shrimp
sand sifting star
serpent star
pincushion urchin
5 chromis ( all are very small right now)
1 fire fish
1 algea blenny
blood shrimp (deceased)

for Coral, I have a small orange polyp, some button polyps, a small kenya tree, a small candy cane and some xenia.

and I haven't started nor ended dosing anything. The only big change made in the water was the switch I made from tap to RO 2 months ago. Aside from that, it has been very consistant. In fact I have friends locally that have tanks that are much older but not as mature.

The shrimp was the newest addition a week ago. I did do some cleaning/ rearranging last night. Think that may have stressed him out? I didn't really go anywhere near him. I did stir the sand a bit in the process and the water went a little cloudy for a few minutes. I don't know. he was about 3 inches long. Maybe I just bought one near the end of it's life cycle.

Like mentioned before, absolutely nothing else in the tank seem to be bothered. Just a starfish that got to eat like a king..........FYI bloodshimp around here sell between $40-$50cdn.

 

If he was that big then it is possible that he might have been close to the end but no one truly knows how old they are. You didn't list your SG.

 

Having a blood, fire, and cleaner shrimp may be asking for trouble in a 65 gallon tank.
Each individual is different in terms of temperment. I have found that when an invert molts, it is especially susceptible to predation. It's a good chance the other shrimp went to pick on it when it was molting and it's new exoskeleton had not hardened yet and they injured him to death.

Your water params seem fine, dKH could be a tiny bit higher but nothing to worry about. The stocking list of fish is responsible and reasonable for your size tank IMO.

I think the poor guy was bullied to death because the two inhabitants (fire/cleaner) were not ready to accept any more competition.

 

Or sometimes usually in the first week they molt and he got caught with his guard down. Metaphorically speaking.

 

I considered the risk of having both a cleaner and a blood. I did the research and spoke to several people that have both, didn't really hear much in terms of problems. Also, my cleaner hangs out in the top right hand corner of my tank....like near the top. The Blood hung out on the completely opposite side. Infact in the week I have seen my cleaner, who is an inch smaller walk over there once. As for temp and sg temp 78 degrees and sg is 1.024

I didn't see if the shrimp molted but it could have very well got caught by the star fish when it was weak. hmmmmm

 

i have 2 skunk cleaners, 1 blood, 1 peppriment shrimp and 1 blue bodied coral banded and they all love each other and well no real fish

 

I agree, I would look to the shrimp being vulnerable during a molt and falling prey to the serpent star.