shrimp-attack.com

There is a new product line on the market for shrimp supplies, called Aquaspid. Three components have been launched:

• Evolve (Food)
• Enhance (Mineral Supplements)
• Eradica (medicament against tank parasites like planarias, threadworms and hydras)

For more information, visit the website: http://www.aquaspid.com. I’ll try out the products in the near future.

If your shrimp has white stuff growing on it’s rostrum it might be parasites or fungal. It is important that you are sure about the diagnosis because the cure differs.

Have a look at a photo of vorticella parasite on a shrimp here. The symptoms of shrimps suffering on this parasite will be better after molting, because the vorticella grips on the exterior skin. The website recommends using Exit or Punktol (both angainst Ichtoy) in normal dosage as described in the package insert. A friend of mine sucessfully used Sera Costapur: 1 drop per 1 litre of water, the vorticella where gone within two days while shrimps were unaffected.

Photos of shrimp having fungus can be found here. The fungus are most often Achlya and Saprolegnia. The symptons get better when shrimp have molt too but this does not mean that they are 100% okay. As treatment, the drug CILEX (producer: Brustmann) Fungol (from JBL) should help. Dose as recommended. It’s important the that mediacment has Malachite green oxalate as active agent.

This site lists all the active agents of the mentioned medicaments. Perhaps you can find a similar drug if you have problems getting a certain medicament in your country: http://www.rhusmann.de/aqua/medikame.htm

I have not tested the cures myself, so take care and ensure a good water quality overall.

Vorticella (source: wikipedia)

A new product against planaria reached Germany: The medicine ‘No Planaria‘ Genchem Ltd is availible lately. This drug is based on a natural palm extract. Though I have not tested it by myself yet, the application reports are good. Looks like the company is still looking for distributers worldwide.

I have made a 95% water change today to get rid of the JBL Furanol2 after 4 days of medical treatment. The water has been prepared with JBL Aqua Dur to get an optimal hardness and pH over 7,5. I have count 8 shrimps left (out of 14) ; two females are berried and none was looking ill like on my former photos. I turned the UV sterilizer on again. If you are interested, check my water parameter table.

After having two more caridina spinata dying, I decided to start a treatment with JBL Furanol2 in my Sulawesi tank. I dosed 2 pills on 27L water netto and turned off the UV sterilizer.

The Golflake shrimp had brown bubbles in the neck and seemed  to have molting probs. I have contacted one person ins this matter who is regulary doing imports of Sulawesi shrimp. He replied that this illness is a problem of only wildcaught Sulawesi shrimp and that it is infectious to other shrimp. Some folks assumes it might be a parasite. This prob is reported from Goldflake, Dennerli, Malili red and Red Line Shrimp. His advice is to separate ill shrimp immediately because infected shrimp will die.

Panacur and Flubenol are medicaments used for deworming cats, dogs and other pets. Due to the lack of missing drugs for fish tanks, shrimp keepers use them to get rid of planaria. Planaria are limped worms with triangular heading and can harm shrimp and their offspring. If your shrimplets always disappear after a few days, planaria may be the reason. They even attack full grown shrimp: The tiger shrimp showed on the pics below was jumping like crazy trough my tank. A closer look showed that a planaria had been creeping inside the body. The shrimp died later on.

While Flubenol uses as active agent ‘flubendazol’, Panacur uses ‘febendazol’.  The components will destroy cell structure of planaria and let them starve after a few days. The drugs are available as powder, pills and liquids. Powder and pills must be dissolved completely in warm water before adding to the tank. It is very important to not overdose the products and have a faithful look at the percentage of active parts! Otherwise your shrimp maybe die or will be crippeled as some people reported.

Here is a step by step guide using Panacur:

1. Try to catch as lot of planaria as possible with a planaria trap and remove them from the tank. Remove snails while using Panacur also.
2. Make your weekly water change (20-30%) and remove as much destritus (=biological waste) as you can.
3. Add the medicament. Prefer to do underdosing more than overdosing! One pill Panacur KH 250 (with 250mg Fenbendazol) is sufficiant for 432 liters. Check out the table below and only calculate with the netto water volume of your tank!
4. After 5 days change 30-50% water and repeat the treatment and dose Panacur second time.
5. After 5 days, do another waterchange (30-50%) and filter with carbon to extract the leftover of medicament.

Disclaimer: Although I have been investigating carfully on this subject, I will not be liable for any problems that may occur using Panacur in a tank. Thank you!