Hypo and shrimp

[jc74]

Will hyposalinity kill shrimp? After lowering the salinity in my tank, my cleaner shrimp died but the others are doing fine. I don't know if this is a coincidence or not. I attempted to remove the infected fish but couldn't catch them, so it's either this or tear my entire tank down to get them out. One of the rocks weighs close to 100 lbs. and it took forever just to get it in the tank. That's where most of them hide.

 

[elfdoctors]

Hyposalinity will kill your shrimp. It is also toxic to all invertebrates and corals (and fortunately ich).
It will also kill off many of the beneficial lifeforms in your live rock. You should try to take out whatever live rock you can (and some of the substrate), to seed the the rest of your live rock when you are finished.
To catch cleaner shrimp, put some food into a net. The cleaner shrimp will often climb right in and then you can take them out.
That sounds like a cool rock!

 

[jc74]

Thanks for the tip. I guess it would be easier to remove the shrimp than the fish...I recently set up a small QT and filled it with water from the main tank.
The banded shrimp will be easy to catch since it jumps on your hand, but the fire shrimp will be difficult. It hides deep in the live rock or in one of the caves in the large rock. It's not nearly as social as the others. I also have a few emerald and hermit crabs that shouldn't be too difficult to remove, but I'm sort of concerned if they'll all get along in the small QT...