Another cleaner shrimp dead. What am I doing wrong?

Sharkbait19 · Apr 22, 2022

This is my third cleaner shrimp. It was doing well, until yesterday when some light algae appeared on its antennae. The next morning, I find it dead next to a half-molted shell. At this point I’m not upset, just really angry. All I’ve read is that cleaner shrimp are easy to keep alive, but every time I drop 40 bucks down the drain, it always goes wrong. In an otherwise mature reef, I’d expect these things to not happen as often, yet here I am yet again. Where did I go wrong?!

lapin · Apr 22, 2022

Possible you have some sort of disease or bacteria that is effecting them.
I doubt it is lack of food or macro nurients like iodine if you have a mature reef.
I have a blood red thats taken over cleaning duties because my cleaner met my big nem and it was all one sided

cdw79 · Apr 22, 2022

How long have you had it / what was your process like to introduce it when you first brought it home? Inverts, but shrimps especially, seem to be really sensitive to water changes and need a painfully slow acclimation. What was your approach?

And what all do you have in your display? The fact it's dead while it was molted is interesting, though you'd assume if something attacked it then it would eat its spoils.

Have they all been from the same LFS? Maybe it's a dealer issue and/or a bacterial infection they all keep picking up like @lapin said?

Bucs20fan · Apr 22, 2022

lack of Iodine in the water will result in a failed molt which is almost 100% always fatal. Its how I lost my first two cleaner shrimp. Since then, water changes and your salt mix will replace the necessary iodine for all crustaceans to molt properly. Shrimp are especially susceptible to this. There is also this disease cleaner shrimp get, I believe it is called black spot disease. Its sometimes fatal but rarely kills quickly, and proper molts tend to cure it with good water quality.

rmorris_14 · Apr 22, 2022

remind me what fish you have in that tank....

Bucs20fan · Apr 22, 2022

+1 to what are the other inhabitants. Shrimp are incredibly vulnerable during and after a molt. Something that would not attack a healthy cleaner knows when a shrimp molts and is an easy target.

Sharkbait19 · Apr 22, 2022

The only fish is currently an Aurora goby who is afraid of her own shadow. The only possible culprit is my emerald crab, but this is extremely unlikely. Given the algae that began to grow on its face, my guess is simply a failed molt…

JoJosReef · Apr 22, 2022

Possible stress molt? Could the nem have fouled the water a bit?

Sharkbait19 · Apr 22, 2022

JoJosReef said:
Possible stress molt? Could the nem have fouled the water a bit?

Possibly, though I removed the nem before anything major happened. I have considered this possibility, though.

Lavey29 · Apr 22, 2022

Sharkbait19 said:
The only fish is currently an Aurora goby who is afraid of her own shadow. The only possible culprit is my emerald crab, but this is extremely unlikely. Given the algae that began to grow on its face, my guess is simply a failed molt…

I think you would be able to identify a predator attack versus a regular demise. Either your LFS is selling unhealthy shrimp or something is off in the tank. I have a banded shrimp. Red fire, cleaner and peppers for almost a year. I didn't acclimate or anything just dropped them straight in the tank

Roatan Reef · Apr 22, 2022

How often are you doing water changes?

How much do you feed your tank on a daily basis???

Roatan Reef · Apr 22, 2022

Lavey29 said:
I think you would be able to identify a predator attack versus a regular demise. Either your LFS is selling unhealthy shrimp or something is off in the tank. I have a banded shrimp. Red fire, cleaner and peppers for almost a year. I didn't acclimate or anything just dropped them straight in the tank

Same, just dropped my Cleaner right in...and he's a greedy *******! Eats all he can, cleans my fish and Corals...sometimes he gets on my nerves because he plucks food from the Corals

Sharkbait19 · Apr 23, 2022

All the shrimps I’ve tried have been from different places, so I don’t think it’s lfs specific. They were from online, not sure if that makes a huge difference.
15% wc every week, I feed every day. Usually pellets or mysis.

DeniseAndy · Apr 23, 2022

That is really a bummer. All good ideas above about the molt, but maybe you should consider iodine additives. It is the only additive I actually use (when I remember). Prodibio is a good one.

Sorry for your losses. I know it sucks when we do not have a good answer for losing our creatures.

Sharkbait19 · Apr 23, 2022

DeniseAndy said:
That is really a bummer. All good ideas above about the molt, but maybe you should consider iodine additives. It is the only additive I actually use (when I remember). Prodibio is a good one.

Sorry for your losses. I know it sucks when we do not have a good answer for losing our creatures.

Thank you.
I was considering starting to dose iodine. I first had the thought after the first shrimp last year, but never did anything because I thought it also had a lot to do with not being a mature enough system. I’ll definitely look into that for the future.

EricR · Monday at 8:08 PM

Old thread but figured I'd chime in since I just lost my first skunk cleaner apparently due to a failed molt:
-- Had the shrimp for 2 years and always had clean molts every month or two
-- Recently, shrimp was fine and aggressively took some clam out of my hand as I was distracting him to spot feed some corals (normal)
-- 3 hours later, I saw the shrimp laying on the ground, struggling with a molt
-- Next day, my urchin was carrying the molt but it looked meatier than normal and the shrimp just looked really bad (deformed antennae and claws)
-- The shrimp continued to move around the tank for about 5 days but was very lethargic and just never looked good
-- Haven't seen the shrimp in about 3 days so assume he died and got consumed by CUC at this point

*on the iodine note, my iodine was always low per ICP (0.012 mg/L) for the first 1+ year I had the shrimp ... I did start dosing Seachem Reef Iodide for a while to see if it would help zoas but stopped when next ICP showed high Iodine (at 0.526 mg/L) so I don't think low iodine was an issue for my shrimp,,, unless high iodine was the problem, but don't think so

SomeHappyFish · Monday at 8:20 PM

How long after acclimation did it pass and how did you acclimate it?

Sharkbait19 · Monday at 8:20 PM

Thanks for the info
Since this thread was started, I’ve began dosing reef carbonate to raise alk, which used to have major swings. Perhaps this will help me in the future if I ever decide to try a cleaner shrimp again.