GAH!!

[Raszagil]

Wow! I turned on the lights just a bit ago to do the nightly before-bed-tank-check, when a bit of motion in one of the holes in my live rock caught my attention.

The mover was white, so I was just about to dismiss it as one of my small shelless snails, when I saw a distinctly crab-like leg tip appear. So I got in real close and found -you guessed it- a crab. This guy is about the size of a dime, hairless, and white.

And he'd just pried one of my tiny clams off the rock and was trying to get it open with his sharp, pointed little claws. Alice, I think I may have been premature to blame the pepperment shrimp for the disappearance of those pink star polyps...they were on the same rock as this crab I just found.

Anyway, I grabbed up the rock and tried to get him out, but he ran deeper into the hole (this rock has my button polyps on it) and so I put it in a tray and sort of jiggled it hopeing to knock him out (no such luck). Then I grabbed some freshwater and a turky baster and flushed the hole with it, drove out lots of pods, tiny snails, worms, e.t.c but no crab.

Seeing as I had no carbonated water around I grabbed my sister's pepsi (over her protests) and doused the hole with that (you should have SEEN the pods abandoning ship by the dozens) didn't work either...

So I rinsed the hole out with freshwater again, and put it back in the tank, and propped a glass with a piece of shrimp in it...we'll see.

And OH NO it couldn't be a mantis...it HAD to be a crab. Sigh.

Crazy!!

Sara

[Raszagil]

I got him!!! I can't believe it!

I'd gone back to my room to shut off the lights and go to bed and so of course I took a peek into the crab's hole (the new skunk cleaner shrimp had already taken the bait out of the cup). Well I noticed there was a small loose flatish rock in there, and something behind it.

Then Mr. Crabby decided to move a bit. BIG MISTAKE!

Apparently the hole does go back a ways, but it's too small for him to get into, so he was huddled underneith the flat rock. Well I grabbed the whole rock back out of the tank again, and with the help of tweezers and two toothpicks I got him out of the hole (and into my mom's favorite bakeing ban ).

He's in a small unheated plastic cup with a piece of live rock right now. He's not white after all, but a light brown...and UGLEE.

I'm not sure what I want to do with him, I'm not going to throw him out or kill him, I paid $7.99 per pound for the live rock, and that includes him.

What a night.

Sara

[NorthCoast]

Nice catch!

When I've been so lucky, the crabs gets sentenced to a life of easy living in my sump. They do a nice job of keeping things orderly down there.

Later,
NC

[SJLord]

Good Job RAZ!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Sorry it wasnt a Mantis ...

S

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Unfortunatly Rasz's sump is still 2 hours south of her, because "someone" is taking way too much time to get their new tank setup
You could put it in the mantis tank, maybe he'd get lucky<eg>
Course if you were mantisphobic they'd be breeding like rats in your tanks

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I thought I was me, but we were wrong
email: geeflipr@internetcds.com

[This message has been edited by geedoug (edited 11-12-2000).]

[Raszagil]

Course if you were mantisphobic they'd be breeding like rats in your tanks

Hehe, this is true! Well he's doing fine so far in the cup... I'm going to keep him, so the mantis tank is out (as I'd never find him again) He'll go in the sump for sure, til then, he's going to stay in the cup.

I wonder how big these guys get? Mine isn't at all hairy, but under the light he does have reddish eyes. Wierd.

Raz

[FishDaddy]

Nice catch, Sara!!
You can help him a bit by putting an airstone in the water. Crabs must be tough because the only time you can kill them is when you're trying to keep them alive!
Dick

[gpohly]

NC,

What kind of intake do you have from your sump to your return pump? My pump connects directly into the sump about 1" up from the bottom, and has a pretty good vacuum - I expect crab moves a little too close, and the reef critters would get a meal of minced crab out of the water returns! (Guess that would make "...a life of easy living in my sump..." a fairly short one )

Do you keep a screen on your intake?

Glenn

[hung]

Sara
Come back to the reef tank chat

7:30 p.m.
11/14/00


Hung