Stocking question 3g Pico

[Jon-Paul]

Hey all,

 

Been running my 3g pico for just about 4 years now and have been eyeing a shrimp for the aquarium.

 

That's a link to my journal, but I have been noticing my nitrate levels are very in check even considering my latest addition of a small red headed goby and daily feedings. I measured my nitrate levels after performing an 80% water change on October 6th and waiting until November 1st to do my next WC of the same amount. With the Hanna checker my nitrate levels were 0.15 over the course of about 1 month. I'm feeding Mysis Shrimp to my Goby daily and target feeding my LPS. I did have some Green Hair Algae buildup on the glass, but nothing a good scrape couldn't solve.

 

Basically I'm wondering if my aquarium can handle the bio-load of a shrimp of some kind (particularly a Scarlet Cleaner Shrimp) or some other invert, but I'm open to other suggestions.

 

I'm suspecting that my corals are just soaking the Nitrates at such a high rate that they don't have time to build up? If I had to guess I would say my phosphates are also in check, but my test kit is outdated. Last time I measured they were <0.1 on the Salifert test.

 

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers!

[WV Reefer]

48 minutes ago, Jon-Paul said:

Hey all,

 

Been running my 3g pico for just about 4 years now and have been eyeing a shrimp for the aquarium.

 

That's a link to my journal, but I have been noticing my nitrate levels are very in check even considering my latest addition of a small red headed goby and daily feedings. I measured my nitrate levels after performing an 80% water change on October 6th and waiting until November 1st to do my next WC of the same amount. With the Hanna checker my nitrate levels were 0.15 over the course of about 1 month. I'm feeding Mysis Shrimp to my Goby daily and target feeding my LPS. I did have some Green Hair Algae buildup on the glass, but nothing a good scrape couldn't solve.

 

Basically I'm wondering if my aquarium can handle the bio-load of a shrimp of some kind (particularly a Scarlet Cleaner Shrimp) or some other invert, but I'm open to other suggestions.

 

I'm suspecting that my corals are just soaking the Nitrates at such a high rate that they don't have time to build up? If I had to guess I would say my phosphates are also in check, but my test kit is outdated. Last time I measured they were <0.1 on the Salifert test.

 

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers!

I think you’ll be fine with just about any type of shrimp in there.  
 

Scarlets are very pretty but tend to be boring. I like sexy shrimp in a small tank. They are hilarious to watch. 
 

[LazyFish]

Anemone shrimp and squat lobsters (cryptic but cool looking) are good choices too. If you havent got polyps and/or feed it well a saron shrimp could be fun. 

A couple of sexy shrimp would be entertaining.

[LazyFish]

An evota or trimea goby could live in here aswell. Or a halloween hermit crab. I'm thinking of fetting a pair of those for my two twenties.

[Tired]

Invertebrates have very low bio-loads, so a shrimp should be fine. I like urocaridella cleaner shrimps- some of them hover! 

 

A Halloween hermit would get far too large for a pico. 

[mcarroll]

On 11/3/2022 at 8:18 PM, Jon-Paul said:

Basically I'm wondering if my aquarium can handle the bio-load of a shrimp of some kind (particularly a Scarlet Cleaner Shrimp) or some other invert, but I'm open to other suggestions.

It's not literally true, but I almost do not look at inverts like these as adding a bio-load at all.  

 

In spite of not being a part of a cleanup crew per se, they will be dedicated scavengers of any food your fish miss.  

 

This will reduce the input of free N and P to your water from rotting food.

 

A nice side benefit of this to your overall bio-load is that adding a shrimp means you will have to add only fractionally more food to the system specifically for them as compared with most other kinds of critters you could add (which would need a whole share of food just for them).

 

Speaking generically, shrimp are really good scavengers....something it seems like you should be able to leverage in such a small tank.

 

I get why you'd want a Scarlet Cleaner given how they look 😍, but would a smaller shrimp actually be a better fit?  (just asking! – I don't even know what your tank looks like 👍)

 

Scarlet Cleaners really are nice.   🙂 

 

Fire shrimp are really nice cleaner shrimp too, but I think slighltly more aggressive AND slightly more shy/cryptic.  Maybe slightly more hearty as well tho!

 

 

$0.02

[Jon-Paul]

@WV Reefer I had a single sexy in there before but he got went missing after a few months. Never did recover him 😑 Getting 2-3 could be a cool idea. I remember they really liked my frogspawn.

 

@LazyFish The anemone shrimp don't pop like I want. I do have some zoa's and I don't think my LFS has any of the squat lobster or saron.

Another goby could be a thing, but I feel it being a 3 gallon with a lot of corals already packed in it could be a problem. I did see my LFS has a Yasha Goby, but I don't know if both would fit, and I don't have a lid on the tank. 3 gallons seems a bit tight for two gobies.

 

@Tired They do have some of the cleaner shrimp you mentioned, but again I want something that pops, so leaning towards the Scarlet/Blood Shrimp.

 

@mcarroll Ah, good to hear that it shouldn't be too much extra of a bio-load. I'm still leaning towards the Fire Shrimp/Skunk, and yes I've heard they can be slightly more shy but there aren't many hiding places in my aquarium! 😂

 

Some shots I took the other day after a cleaning (and new orange filter for my camera).

 

 

 

Thanks for all the replies.