Yes there is still 1 peppermint in my tank and I cannot get him out. I tried for almost 2 hours after removing the other 4 and the cleaner shrimp but this one keeps pulling a disappearing act, then when I move my rocks around, it stirs up the sand, which is oolitic so I think hes staying in there. I was not cycling the tank with the clowns. I had 45 LBS of what I thought was cured LR (had it in a bucket for 2 weeks with a skimmer, heater, and powerhead) and added another 30 LBS of packaged LS, let that sit in the tank for a week, tested the water and it was Amm 0, Nitrites 0, Nitrates about 7 so I thought it was safe to add some clowns. The clowns never really ate from the start except for one, then a week later I added the shrimp. About 2 or 3 days later I saw a little ammonia starting to show up, so I did water changes but still the clowns didnt eat and they started to look more sick, the shrimp were fine. The clowns died after about 10 days so I decided I would fully cycle my tank, thinking that the 0.25 reading of ammonia was the cause of their death but then I thought that the shrimp would have died also, which they havent. Either way, Im making sure the tank fully cycles, which it looks like it has enough bacteria all ready to keep ammonia levels in check b/c 3 cocktail shrimp and 1 peppermint shirmp who got caught in a powerhead have been in there since last Thrusday and ammonia was still only 0.25 or less as of last night.
Buzz thanks for your reply and your help and Azrile I think you are right too. So thanks for the help guys, hopefully after this cycle, I can get some clowns but I need to figure out how to tell if they are healty at first.
And swilbs83 there is not need to jump down peoples throats without knowing or asking for all the details first. just a suggestion