The water seems to be in good shape. No ammonia or nitrite. Normal nitrate. TDS stable for long time at ~183.. same with ph, gh and kh.

I moved the tank to a corner since I got the new tank and it seems that the shrimps were more active when ignored. It's one of the rare occasion when I look into the tank and saw it happen.

got No3 nitrate!!, seem like cycled unless your tap water full of nitrate in the first place, you dose alot of bacteria powder/liquid or
borrow old filter media?

Agreed. A lesson learnt for me back then as I didn't do that much wc...hence algae attack was crazy. Well, guess sometimes we just have to learn it the hard way

Just thankful it turn out for the better now...that both plants and shrimps are doing ok. Although hoping no time bomb since I've got some air pockets in the soil.
My Malayans are diggers...they really know how to dig around searching for food. So perhaps it's good to have soil for them to dig around. A more natural environment for them I guess.

By the way...what's the orange soil you're referring to?
Nice tank you got there bro. What's that black bag hanging at the back of the tank?

I meant the old tank lah... new tank still have now fauna.

Growing BB and moss now.

ADA Africana. I have one tank with that soil. Oh dear, how to add the soil now to the malaya tank? shrimp already in the tank (cycled tank ex-fish).

oic, anyway for the new tank, beside checking for ammonia, after 3days can also check for nitrite.
Some of the tank i setup with old filter, it jump to stage 2 cycle after 2~3days.

Orange soil, i like it initially but stay away after my shrimp show poor color on it, maybe oldman eyes no good.
Add new soil to existing tank, tricky abit, cos it will cloud the water, and if your tank filter is new, more problem cos need long cycle.

I would like to share picture here but somehow cannot download using normal practise.

A bit off, i'm trying to setup a aquarium for shrimp, does this look strong to you for 10 years? 2x1x1 feet aquarium. The welding looks ok but i'm not sure any one have bad experience with it...

So far my fire red, yellow and blue velvet shows good colour in this soil colour.

But I have sponge filter in Malaya tank..so how to cycle water? I would need to take out the shrimp 1st, add soil and add on shrimp again later?

I got my 3rd batch of Malayan shrimps from arrow too! This time it's 20

Oh what happend to your previous 2 batches?

Just open a free flickr account... www.flickr.com

Upload your photos

Copy and paste into the forum as per pic below. You get much better quality photos, don't load the lowyat servers and don't even need to resize.

Look ok, if you afraid, don't keep expensive shrimp in it , just normal cherry and some fire red. If not for peace of mind, get a new bigger one eheheh.