Emerald Crabs, reef safe or not?

[grimlock3000]

I had an Emerald Crab for a long time and it was very peaceful, it would run around the edges of the tank and night and go about its life without disturbing anything. It molted and then was promptly was eaten by tankmates with no prior warning a few months back.

Three weeks ago I bought another Emerald Crab from the same LFS. The new Crab did not seem to mind being out with the tank light on too much for the first day so I was happy with it. The next night I was suspiciously missing some Green Star Polyps. The night after that, my Toadstool has very noticable gashes in it, and my Sinularia and Xenia was in bad shape. I checked with a LFS and they reccomend that I try feeding the Crab Nori every night for a while since it could be malnourished from when I bought it. The Crab would eat the Nori however I kept losting pieces of coral, just at a slower pace. Finally I caught the Crab standing on my Sinularia and just eating it in the middle of the tank. The Crab is no longer in my tank, and my Corals are growing back.

How often does this happen? Should I just try another Emerald Crab or move onto something else like a Porcelain crab?

 

[austinsdad]

They're usually OK in a reef. Is it green?

 

[cd5]

Good to know because I have been debating trying an emerald crab in my coral tank

 

[Fluff]

No crab is truely reef safe and even though the emerald mythrax crabs are known for eating algae, all crabs are opportunists. It's not uncommon to get a rouge crab.

 

[ZoozFishMaster]

As Fluff mentioned, Emerald crabs are opportunistic. They are going to eat what is available and plentiful. I, personally, have never had a problem with emeralds in reefs. But if there is not enough food available, it is not uncommon for them to give your corals and smaller inverts a try. HTH and Good Luck!

 

[ZoozFishMaster]

As Fluff mentioned, Emerald crabs are opportunistic. They are going to eat what is available and plentiful. I, personally, have never had a problem with emeralds in reefs. But if there is not enough food available, it is not uncommon for them to give your corals and smaller inverts a try. HTH and Good Luck!

 

[lando]

I have two in my nano and four in my 72gal. They do not seem to bother a thing. They do climb on my encrusting corals like GSP in searc of food but never seem to do any damage.

 

[hcuellart]

Never had a problem with kine, the only thing I hate about it is that sometimes it robs my LPS's food when I feed them at night...

 

[chineseknife]

If you look between the joints inbetween the claw and arm you should be able to see some red color there., indicating it's reef safeness. I had two, but one never made it all the way through a molt and stayed white for some time before finally dieing on me. The other crab has grown quite large and is a very interesting character..

-ck

 

[AquaReefer]

My Buddy and I have a few in our reefs with no problems (knock on wood)

 

[melosu58]

I had several that have been OK . I `ve always thought that they were reef safe

 

[Guest]

I had one in a 20 reef I did and like mentioned before it was an opportunistic eater. It personally liked the leathers that were in there. To bad it didn't have a taste for xenia's. At the time those things were even growing on the overflow box and needed to be taken care of anyway. However, emerald crabs IMHO are about 50/50. You might get one thats okay like your first but then you might go threw a couple of them that arn't. Personally I won't put them in the next reef tank I do. Probably only use them in FOWLR setups from now on.