Cherry shrimp help!

Made a bit of an impulse buy and bought ten red cherry shrimp on ebay, they are currently on their way to arrive tomorrow! I've been prepping up on how to care for them+have an empty ten gallon tank nicely planted for them, but realised I dont have a heater! Is this essential, or will they be okay at a little below room temp? May have to run out and buy one otherwise!

Also, is gravel an okay substrate for them? I'm planning on feeding them fishfood and some blanched greens, do they need supplements/ salt? please offer any experience/ advice on caring for them. I assumed they were a bit of a no brainer to look after, but their imminent arrival has got me worried, it would be nice not to kill them on their first day! Thanks

They do best at aproximately 25ºC, but they tolerate colder temps. Room temp (about 20-22ºC?) will work but they will grow and reproduce slowlier. I´d worry about a heater only if you want the shrimp to be at maximum production, otherwise, it´s not strictly necessary. Mine still reproduced at 17ºC or lower, but it was a much slower process.
I think gravel is perfectly fine. It may trap some of the food, but the shrimp are very dexterous in getting to it anyway.
They don´t really need suppements although they certainly need enough calcium in the water or in the diet. I think it´s unlikely that calcium will ever be a problem with a good diet unless your water is acidic.

Hi!

We've got a huge breeding colony of these guys...here's my advice:

1) I find that they do better in a heated tank..78 degrees or so...however, they should be fine at a little below room temp, although they may not breed as prolifically.

2) What types of plants do you have? Shrimp like plants that are really dense, like mosses, for breeding. They also like to hide under driftwood.

3) They do not need supplements or salt. Just plain fishfood should be fine, but careful not to overfeed. Shrimp are scavengers, they'll eat any old garbage lying around the tank, but they are small, so they don't need that much. If you only have ten, you probably only need to give them like, 5 flakes a day.

4)They are not the most delicate things in the world, you probably wont' kill them, don't worry.

5) The most important thing with shrimp is NO COPPER. Copper is toxic to all invertebrates so before you feed them anything make sure there is none of that in there. Some shrimp foods I've seen actually have copper in them....so be careful with that.

Good luck with your colony!!
Baby shrimplets make good treats for newts too .

They are very easy to care for, temp is not that important say over 15C up to upper twenties are ok, keep the water clean and the shrimps fed and all will be good.

Great food is algae and soft vegetables methinks, because they dont mess up the water parameters too bad. Best is to keep them in an algae colony, because the algae takes care of the water quality and provides great food at the same time.
If you feed them heavy food, like fish food etc you might want to put in a very simple filter or plant heavily.
Main thing is to keep the water clean and stable, so reg water changes and easy on the feeding.

Seeing that we all posted ta the same time...Yes, most ppl recommend higher temps for the reasons Az mentioned but they do fine at room temp.

Turns out they're coming tomorrow morning, I am too excited its just not cool Thank you so much everyone for your advice, my fears about temperature have been put at rest! Yeah all they have at the moment is a load of floating elodea and some broad leaved plants, think if they all arrive safe and well I'll go and splash out on some moss to keep them happy

Great to hear they can survive on fish food, they sound pretty indestructible, short of sprinkling copper into their tank! Although I might change my tune when they arrive, I can't stop thinking of every possible shrimp based trauma! Good to know that newts enjoy them, in that case I'm hoping they breed so my axolotls can munch on a few shrimp every now and then, but at the moment they'll just be pets, focussing on settling them into their new tank before subjecting them to hungry amphibians!