Strange deaths and occurances dealing with RCS

[Stevecmanning]

Hi Guys. I'm Steve and I'm new to the Forum as well as new to freshwater shrimp. Anywho, I thought I might start off things with a little problem that happened yesterday. I've had a 10 Gallon Cherry Shrimp tank for a month or so now. Anywho, I ordered some plants online and got them yesterday. I cleaned them and soaked them in declorinated water(Seachem Prime for the declor) for a few hours like I normally do with my other Freshwater tanks. As always I checked the chemistry of my tank and everything was pretty alright. The shrimp were happily doing their thing grazing and hanging out on the Marimo Balls as usual. Then I added the plants in. Within 2 hours, my Cherry Shrimp started running around like they were on fire. Then, They would turn belly up, lose their color and just die. I lost about 4. The survivors huddled in the top corner of the tank near my filter lip. Could it be that one of my plants is poisonous or toxic to my shrimp? I thought it might be so I removed my plants and put into a bucket for the time being. Now, then this is where it gets wierd. When I removed the new plants... About 3 or so hours later, they seem to liven up abit and went down the the moss balls to graze or whatnot. Now this morning they're doing they're normal thing like nothing happened...

I added these plants to my tank...

Petite Nana (Anubias Pygmy Nana)
Dwarf Hairgrass (Eleocharis acicularis)
Dwarf Baby Tears (Hemianthus callitrichoides)

These plants were already there...
3 Marimo Balls
A patch of Pellia

Anywho, any ideas what could be the problem? Should I clean the plants more or soak them for a few days or something? Kinda confused on what to do here. =(.

Thanks in advance,
Steven

[imke_j]

Could it be that one of my plants is poisonous or toxic to my shrimp?

Hi Steven,

not the plants are toxic to your shrimps but the pesticide aginst any snail on it. Usually, I leave new plants for 3 weeks in a bucket with water and change the water daily since shrimp are very sensitive to pesticide. Some folks also think that anubias are harmful to invertebrates but I coudln't oberserve this personally.

Imke

[Stevecmanning]

Ah, thanks Imke. So I guess I'll soak them for awhile and see how that goes. I know this is off topic but what kind of tiger shimp is on your picture... It looks just plain cool. =D

Thanks!
Steve

[mcgrimes]

Hey steve, i recently suffered from strong pesticides present on plants and ended up losing about 30 rcs! :(

[retardo]

The other guesses are pretty spot on. I think it was the presence of pesticides on the introduced plants. Some growers grow the plants emersed and spray pesticides or other commercial fertilizers which may be great for plants, but harmful to shrimp. Sorry for the loss, but nice save as well!!