Hey Fish Friends!
I came back from a 3 week vacation, followed directly by catch up and back to school madness, to find scud fest 2021 in one of my shrimp tanks. I had two shrimp populations in the tank (one caridina and one neo). They wiped out the caridina population (mostly- don't think they will come back) and brought even the neos down two about 1/3 of what they were (these will probably come back). Unfortunately, I have always had some scuds in this particular tank, but with regular removal to feed to other fish, they haven't really impacted the shrimp. Although, I am sure my tiger badis appreciated the hundreds I manually removed yesterday (the do look very pretty today, fingers crossed for babies), I am looking for a better way. Darn scuds have to go. At least from my shrimp tanks. Another issue is that there are shrimplets in the tank that appear to be from the caridina species that I would really like back, so I'm hesitant to introduce anything that would eat scuds as it would likely also take out my shrimplets. Help! Please!
p.s. Scuds are great fish food. Have never looked into what particular species I have, but they produce like mad and everybody eats them. If anyone every feels like driving out to Centreville, VA to porch pick up a bag a dozen+, let me know! Would research prior to introducing to a tank with expensive plants or snails. Fish eat them before they bother mine, but I can't speak competently on the subject and have read a few articles that sound fishy. I have two unvaccinated children under the age of 12 (my husband and I are fully vaccinated) who are attending school. We prefer no-little outside masked contact.
I don't know of any way to get rid of scuds that won't also affect at least some of your shrimp. I should note, however, that I recently had a tank where I had some small Apistogramma and I kept adding scuds and the occasional shrimp to the tank. The scuds were quickly eaten, but the adult shrimp survived. In other words, it may be possible to add small predatory fish that will eat scuds, but not the adult shrimp. I assume they will eat baby shrimp, however. Obviously, there is a lot of risk with this approach.
As far as scuds being good food for fish, they absolutely are. Very small fish and all the corydoras I keep will not eat them, but almost anything else goes crazy for them.
Good luck!
What Caridina species did you have in the tank?