Tds At 130, Gh At 6?

In my CBS tank I try to keep my TDS around 130. Most people recommend keeping CRS/CBS between 150 and 180, but I wanted to keep mine a bit lower in case I wanted to add some blue bolts or king kongs later on.

However, my GH is at 6 (possibly 7), and I'm not sure how...

I am using distilled water with a TDS of 0 as my base, and Salty Shrimp GH+. This is strange because the packaging suggests that a TDS of 200+/- is approximately 6 dGH. My TDS is a whole 70 ppm lower, so I would assume my GH would only be about 4.

My GH testing regent does expire next month.

Now, this is not a breeding setup. I currently have 7 adults, a few of which are berried, but I do run low CO2 on the tank which I realize may impact breeding. It's just a 2 gallon planted nano tank. But should I try lowering my TDS even more to get to a target GH of 4, or just keep it stable at 6-7 GH since the shrimp are healthy and obviously reproducing?

 

HI fahn the fact your shrimp are berried says it all it may be to do with the Co2 I don't know as I've never gone down that road and you probably know more about it than me, they always approximate and never a definitely so read through that and adjust your water accordingly so it may be higher or lower TDS to get the gh required, my tanks have CRS &CBS in two different tanks two different volumes to get my gh to 4 my one tank as a TDS of 96 & the other is 110, so all tanks differ, your gh may bd a bit higher because of as we suggested the Co2 or something could be leaching in the tank like rocks that will rise gh levels I know that as a fact as it happened to me so there are unknowns that can rise your gh, back to your tank you have berried shrimp so it's working for you there so stick with what your doing at the moment and monitor things if you find they are breeding slow then you can lower your gh a point or two adding blue bolt later won't kill them with a slightly higher gh they just may not breed, my gh crept up to 11 with a tds of 150 and it was down to a Welsh slate leaching into the tank CRS were fine they just stopped breeding, I've only read a little on co2 and shrimp which have conflicting reports if it's good or not but the fact and I'll say it again that it's working for you proves your doing it right so stick with what's working for you and only take action when needed, as a rule now that I've got my tanks where it's working for me I use the TDS meter as a guide only and find my tds rises about 8 points weekly so I adjust my mineral mix accordingly but I do dip the meter in all my tanks daily when checking in on the guys as routine now just to make sure things are going ok and still do a weekly gh test

 

GH is calcium and magnesium. Shrimp use/absorb both minerals.

TDS is comprised of a whole lot of things, minerals, metals, salts, organic waste, etc. GH is part of your TDS, but they are not the same.

"The rate at which a shrimp will molt/shed it exoskeleton has a lot to do with its environment and level of GH. The Calcium carbonate in the water is absorb by your shrimp and this is what creates new exoskeletons. With low levels of Calcium carbonate they will not develop proper shells and will have a harder time fighting off diseases, infections, and their overall health and immune system will not be up to par.
When talking about calcium carbonates you must also learn about magnesium as it is the key factor in making the calcium carbonate absorbable by your shrimp. If no magnesium was present in your aquarium your shrimp would suffer from lack of levels of calcium and soon after simply die off."

 

Skavatar I like that

 

HI fahn the fact your shrimp are berried says it all it may be to do with the Co2 I don't know as I've never gone down that road and you probably know more about it than me, they always approximate and never a definitely so read through that and adjust your water accordingly so it may be higher or lower TDS to get the gh required, my tanks have CRS &CBS in two different tanks two different volumes to get my gh to 4 my one tank as a TDS of 96 & the other is 110, so all tanks differ, your gh may bd a bit higher because of as we suggested the Co2 or something could be leaching in the tank like rocks that will rise gh levels I know that as a fact as it happened to me so there are unknowns that can rise your gh, back to your tank you have berried shrimp so it's working for you there so stick with what your doing at the moment and monitor things if you find they are breeding slow then you can lower your gh a point or two adding blue bolt later won't kill them with a slightly higher gh they just may not breed, my gh crept up to 11 with a tds of 150 and it was down to a Welsh slate leaching into the tank CRS were fine they just stopped breeding, I've only read a little on co2 and shrimp which have conflicting reports if it's good or not but the fact and I'll say it again that it's working for you proves your doing it right so stick with what's working for you and only take action when needed, as a rule now that I've got my tanks where it's working for me I use the TDS meter as a guide only and find my tds rises about 8 points weekly so I adjust my mineral mix accordingly but I do dip the meter in all my tanks daily when checking in on the guys as routine now just to make sure things are going ok and still do a weekly gh test

Thanks for the reply. I just find it strange that there is no set TDS to GH ratio with my shrimp salt. I have no rock in the tank at all, just a carpet of pearlweed and a single small piece of driftwood I found at the beach last year. The substrate is Controsoil, an aquasoil.

A lot of sources say CO2 will impact shrimp breeding, and I'm sure this is true. However, given this is only a 2 gallon tank I had no intentions of them even breeding. The CO2 is low, only 8-15ppm, half or less of the recommended concentration for a high tech system. The pH is around 5.8 during peak CO2 hours as well. No signs of stress or lethargy from the shrimp.

I even have a bunch of Neocaridina babies in this tank and they have been growing and doing just fine. Despite the soft water and low pH they are active.

In the future I want to do dedicated breeding setups, but for now space is an issue.

 

Skavatar is pretty keyed up on this perhaps he can shed some light on it and the link he put on is worth a read, I have neocaradina & caradina in the same tank and breeding I mixed these due to space but there's a very find on parameters which can only be achieved with RO water but found over time the breeding as dropped off greatly so I've now decide to put a tank in my outside shed for my black rose so I can put them both back to how it should be