will my serpent eat my peppermint?

[dawgs]

i have 2 serpent stars and i put 2 peppermint shrimp in my tank yesterday...i havent seen the shrimp since....are they hiding? or did the stars chow down?

[Jeremy1973]

Doubtful that the stars ate them. Unless they died. Chances are, they are hiding until they get comfortable with their new home. I put in a new shrimp the other day, and it took 3 days before I caught a glimpse of him. So, be patient.

[ChrisC1029]

I have 3 fairly large serpent stars (about 7 inches arm tip to arm tip) and 1 smaller serpent (about 3 inches) in my display tank with seven peppermints. The peppermints would all hide in the rock during the "daylight" hours and I'd never see them. However, after about a month they started coming out from their hiding places and now they are out most of the time. So my guess is yours are just hiding until they get comfortable like was said above. The serpents and peppermints pretty much leave each other alone, except they sometimes get into tug-o-wars over food.

[Harpo]

We, have had a brittle star for a little over 2 years that grew huge. Was never a problem till the last 2 weeks, our Blue Mandrin and 2 Peppermint shrimp came up missing. We caught him red handed eating one of the shrimp Yesterday he took a ride to the LFS, and was traded for a new Mandrin.

Harpo

[ChrisC1029]

Harpo:
Was yours a green brittle star? I have heard of the green brittle stars being a problem at times. I haven't heard the same about the serpent stars, although I can't say that they wont take some shrimp as prey, I just haven't heard of them doing so.

[Doug1]

Green brittles and any large brittle or serpent can possibly prey on fish and what not if forced to scrounge exclusively for food. But if the shrimps are new and the stars are fed they are prolly hiding, I had peppermints I never saw for about 3 weeks

[Sylock]

My nano is a peppermint shrimps hell! I've got a large yellow and black serpent. I've had 4 peppermint shrimp 'dissapear' in it over the last 6 months.

The first was there for 2 1/2 months until I introduced the star. Then it only lasted a month.

I introduced two more peps and they were happy for about 4 days. Then they were just gone.

I then put in a large cleaner that was happy and grew even larger. For about 3 months he was great. Then he was just gone one day.

Then 4 days ago I bought two more peps. The smaller one is already gone.

All parameters are at zero and I feed my star once a week (except that it had been two weeks when the cleaner dissapeared).

[Harpo]

Chris, the star we had was black in color. Had it since it was a tiny baby. It used to sit under a rock, but we were able to hand feed it regularly, but a few weeks ago it moved to an area we couldn't reach. So I guess it took to it's own feeding.


Harpo

[ChrisC1029]

Well. I guess I stand corrected. Apparently serpent stars will at least occassionally take peppermint shrimp. I also checked my copy of Julian Sprungs invertebrate book, which does say that they are " detritovore, carnivorous, scavenger that feeds on fish feces, dead organisms and uneaten food". So I guess the carnivorous part would cover occassional peppermints.

....maybe after a meal of detritus, fish feces and dead organisms, they need an after dinner mint....

[tdwyatt]

Originally posted by ChrisC1029
...maybe after a meal of detritus, fish feces and dead organisms, they need an after dinner mint....

ROTFLMAO!!!!!

... That was WELL put...