Molting Problem

[Jojodog]

Hi all

Over the past few days, I noticed some of my Yellow and RCS are molting. Several of them had partially molted and died. currently, there is 1 CRS and 1 yellow stuck in their molt and struggling to get free. My water is at: 6.4ph, 5gh and 1kh. Anything that I can do to help?

Thanks in advance

Dan

[hlee72ca]

Your general hardness, GH, is too low. Try some Fluval Shrimp Mineral Supplement, to raise your GH to min. of 4.

[Tarobot]

huh, he says he has 5gh. what do you feed them?

[hlee72ca]

oops I missed the 5 gh. lol. how are your ammonia, nitrite and nitrate readings?

[Jojodog]

I feed them zuchinni, lettuce, algae wafer and fluval ebi pellets. Only thing has changed was on weekend, I installed a new adjustable heater which I set a couple of degrees from 78 to 76f

[Kmarrs]

I don't know if adding a little bit of Iodide would help? I find it helps soften the sw inverts shells idk if the same applys here.

[kmc5]

I had the same problem with the red cherry shimps and I feel ya. I have solved it by adding seachem iron suppliment. Iron has many uses beside plant photosynthesis. It assists in some iron-exchange. The molting problem, from others by word of month, is that the mucus around its month is to "sticky" so the shell is binded to that area thus causing an incomplete molting process. Recommend,
Change water more frequent as it induces molting, which is caused by the changes in temperature and water condition. Do little water changes like 5% every 4 days. I like to prepare my water by adding specified amount of nutuients and iron stuff first and sit for 3 days before use. It is my stock solution that gives consistancy in concentrations also decreases the shock to the system.

You should also invest on mineral rocks to add stability in the water. pH is not really important but having it stable at any value is. Your KH is low so your buffering capcity is weak which results in a bug swing in pH when u change water.

GH to tell you the true, it doesn't tell you much as it only measure calcium and mg more. Only Tds and conductive values gives u more accurate results. But u have to raise it like at 6.

I have both rcs and crs grade S at pH > 8, when testing, the color is blue. And GH & KH > 10.

Hope this helps.

[BettaGuy]

Did you do a water change before your shrimp started having moulting problems? If the answer is yes, it may be as simple as not matching the water chemistry of the new water to the tank's current water, shocking them. This effect is amplified if you did a larger water change, as mentioned above. Best of lucK!