This is MY experience and why I'm no longer buying imported wild bucephalandra.  I've never been one to add random plants to my shrimp tanks, I’ve always thought it could turn out bad and now I remember why.

Recently I purchased 6 Skeleton King bucephalandra. I received them on April 25th, they were promptly placed in a quarantine bucket for ~3 weeks. The water was changed in the bucket multiple times using water taken out of shrimp tanks. After ~3 weeks the buce were then added to 4 tanks using the same method I've used over the years. Super glued to cholla or mineral rock, whichever was already in the tank. ALL 4 tanks proceeded to have HUGE deaths the following days. One of my larger colonies had 99% die within 2 days. It was apparent that the buce was absolutely the cause of this. Immediately I removed the buce and put them back into the bucket and proceeded with multiple large water changes. Since then there has a been a few more deaths in every tank every few days. I let the vendor know, of course this was the first they’ve heard of this happening. 100% without any doubt the deaths were the result of the buce.  I talked to a few trusted people about MY experience and they shared very similar experiences with imported wild buce. It has come to my understanding that many imported wild buce are now often being sprayed with sort of copper treatment to combat any possible pests. As we all know copper is VERY dangerous to our prized dwarf shrimp. If this is the case, it's impossible to know how much the plant is retaining/absorbing into the leafs/roots/etc. and later releasing into our shrimp tanks. I'm also wondering if the copper is being absorbed into the tank silicone, sponge filters, soil, etc etc and still causing deaths even though the plants were immediately removed. Please note this is the first time this has happened to me, but not the first time I've heard of people having deaths after adding imported buce to their shrimp tanks. Since I had such a huge loss in multiple tanks I thought it important to share MY experience.  I know a lot of the laws/rules have changed for the buce exporters and I hope this doesn’t become a more common issue for us shrimp keepers. I'm sharing MY experience so others can ask their supplier to 10000% honestly verify their buce are NOT BEING TREATED WITH ANY CHEMICALS that will kill our precious shrimp. Its very heartbreaking to see a thriving prized colony dwindle down to next to none in days from something beyond my control. This may upset some people but I believe its more important to share MY experience so others don't have the same thing happen to them.


Bucephalandra Skeleton King

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