Short video update
This aquarium houses dwarf species, like fish, shrimps and snails (excluding plant sp.). As well as that it's a home of diverse micro life forms, including algae, fungus, microorganisms and bacteria.
I added Active Carbon to the Filter system to remove everything that might possibly hurt the shrimps and fish. Since I experienced a few shrimp deaths, I had to do something. I believe this was the best solution.
The Staghorn algae;
I have noticed Crystal Red shrimplets about a month ago, but never had an opportunity to make a good shot really, until now. Since this tank is fully planted it is hard to see all the shrimp babies. I can count around 10 shrimplets at a time.
New fish+shrimps were introduced at the 10th of January 2007. approx 18 Rasbora maculata and approx 20 Crystal Red shrimps (CRS). This aquarium sure deserves to be called "the South East Asia biotope". The Flora and the Fauna of this tank of mine can be found in Asia.
They go crazy for it and are showing great color and reproductive capacity ;-) Baby shrimps are all over the tank. The Java moss is beautifully taking over the aquarium. I have to trim it every two weeks.
Mature set-up ;Newly established set-up ;
The good news is one of the Cherry shrimps is carrying eggs, which was a pleasure to see.
I am very happy to see my female Red Cherrys becoming more red. Young females are known to be more pale, but after each moulting the are turning more red. And because of that I am starting to realise that I probably have only ONE MALE !!! I just hope this little guy can fertilise all the females...hm. I believe I am better off buying another male or two. The next two photos are showing the one male I have. RCS males are very pale with very little red on the top of their abdomen, and that is more like red dots. The abdomen shape is not as deep as the females is. If you take a closer look (the first female photo) you will notice that the females abdomen is rather deep, so it can store and protect the eggs. I am 99% sure that the pale shrimp is male. Time will tell.
And since they enjoy eating microorganisms from the Oak leaf litter, I collected some more from a near by park. I am soaking them in a bit of dechlorinated water, so they sink readily. The more leaf litter, the more surfaces for the microorganisms to grow on. I will try to collect more withered Oak leaves before the season is over.
Photos by Dusko Bojic.
Another female lost the eggs. I can see one carrying only 2-3 eggs, how sad. I am not sure what is causing them to release the eggs so soon. Is it possible that those two male RCS can't fertilise???
Today I found one of my shrimps dead amongst Java moss.
I discovered that the Oligochaetes spp. is not the only worm I have in this tank. I have quiet a lot of those Flatworms shown on this photo above. They glide very fast for a 1.5 mm creature.
Two days ago I discovered few RCS females having white saddles forming in their carapace and spreading into the abdomen, dorsally (producing eggs, see the 1st photo). In the beginning I had a feeling that I got 9 males and 1 female, but now I am quiet sure that it is the other way around. Some females are not that red which is confusing with sex ID, but the white saddle makes it clear now.
Toady a realised that I probably have more than one female. They are more red today as they settled down. All 10 of my Red Cherrys are active in search for food, and picking up "things" from stones and plants. Just in a case that they were starved in the LFS, I fed them with a very small piece of the HIKARY Algae Wafers, which they seem to like. My plan is to feed them with algae wafers two to three times a week. I am not sure should I feed them with other food types in between. I would rather have them eat the algae and the microorganisms that are growing inside the tank.