I currently have two pistol shrimps and a yellow watchman and Yasha goby in my 25G lagoon.
Here's my path to how I ended up with both in the tank
- Started with a Dracula Goby and pistol shrimp - Dracula Goby jumped through my lid mesh a week later and turned to jerky while sunbathing directly below my light on top of the lid.
- couldn't find pistol shrimp a week or two later, so I assumed dead. Bought a Randall's Goby/pistol pair.
- Randall's goby was fine for two weeks, then one day I find his head - no body, no skeleton. Nass snails demolished it in less than a day
- Got a Yasha who has been doing well and has paired up with the pistol from the Randall's Pairing.
- one day about 3 weeks ago, the original pistol shrimp I had with the Dracula goby suddenly appears moving sand and making a burrow on the exact opposite side of the tank as Yasha/Shrimp pair
- Thought, what the heck....let's add a YWG. YWG was introduced to tank using a small deli container and only allowed to escape container into burrow of the original pistol shrimp. Worked like a charm, both gobies and shrimp are paired up and happy on their respective sides of the tank.
I wouldn't be scared about the shrimp dying. They're tiny and wouldn't affect your parameters in the least bit if they bit the dust in your IM40.