Mantis Shrimp v. Rest of Tank

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OneBowl

Aquarium Advice Regular
Joined
Mar 19, 2004
Messages
82
Location
Coopersburg, PA
OK, from hours upon hours of reading off this great site, it's pretty apparent that mantis shrimp are not welcome critters in a tank. What I don't have a good handle on is how much havoc a mantis shrimp can cause in a tank. Just what kind of livestock can a mantis take out, crabs, pods, worms, damsels, lion fish, great whites, or what? My apology in advance if this message causes some to re-live some tragic events. Thanks AA.
 
from my reading and understanding i believe the main damage the ones ya get from liverocks.com is that they will go after snails/hermits shelled critters due to their clubbing ability but spearing type can and will kill fish so if ya dont mind buy snails from time to time who cares i guess right !! reeftopia has cheap snails just my thoughs !!
 
I think the mantis has a gotten a bad rap from some reefers. Mantis in gerneral are awesome creatures. There are several different species some of which are very colorful like the peacock mantis. As scuba said, smaller inverts are goners when it comes to the smashing/club type mantis (which seems to be the most common hitchhiker). I have one that is now closing in on 5" long in a nano reef that I recently started feeding by hand. He's is probably my favorite animal in the arsenal. But even as big as he is, he doesn't touch turbo snails. I just don't think he can get through the thicker shell they have. So if you don't mind the big bulldozing turbos...


R-
 
yea i had to keep the two i ended up getting !! they are just to cool and curious creatures to say the least !! worst case imo it worth the $10 on a 10 gallon to keep them and enjoy watching them !!
 
My little hitchiker mantis is less than 1" and he's already taken to hand feeding. He's a lot of fun. I've got a couple of small crabs that I'm concerned about...but if the mantis takes them out I suppose the mantis is more interesting than they are.

10yrs ago, I sentenced a mantis to death after the death of one of my fish. Now...with the perspective of time, I'm not sure that he was actually guilty.

Sumphead....you think your 5" mantis is still behaving himself? That's good news. Makes me a lot less concerned about my little guy.
 
Smashers go after shrimp, snails, and crabs. Spearers go after shrimp and fish. They are amazing predators. Thank God they aren't bigger and terrestrial.

Here's some info http://www.blueboard.com/mantis/index.htm and more info http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/aquarius/index.html plus some more http://globetrotter.berkeley.edu/people/Caldwell/caldwell-con0.html

In spite of my affinity for mantis, I don't recommend hand feeding. Even the smashers have spearer-like barbs on their clubs and can do quite a bit of damage. Even Dr. Roy Caldwell was concerned once with a cut that didn't seem to heal after a puncture wound. I figure if the foremost stomatopodist was concerned, I should also take precautions.

I would have to say that they are the most fascinating critters I've ever had the opportunity to care for.
 
I agree, I keep 2 of them, each in their own tank and they are great fun. Very intelligent and I feed them with a little stick or zip tie with a little piece of shrimp on the end.

Snap snap snap.. my wife just rolls her eyes when she hears the snapping because she thinks they are creepy looking. But secretly I think she's beginning to like them a little bit.
 
Glad to hear that there is a liberation movement to end the flushing of the mantis. That's all I have to offer. :wink:
 
I've got 6 of them in an undesirable tank (undesirable in my reef) which includes crabs and mantis. They're doing fine, but don't move much. They pretty much hide.
 
You'd be surprised...the mantis have actually kept to themselves pretty much so far. I think only 2 small crabs were "sacrificed".
 
I wondered about that too, my big crabs had to be manually removed because they just kept growing bigger and bigger but my cool porcelains disappeared. :(

Also some of the very tiny hairy crabs disappeared. And once I put some of the captured larger crabs into the 20g with one of my mantises, I actually witnessed the mantis crackin' away at the carapace of the bigger crabs. It just scared the big crabs, and they ran away, but it didn't split 'em open.

It was actually a weird sound, more like a "ting" than a snap. Like the crab carapace was tinging like a drinking glass.

So perhaps the little mantises are only really able to knock out & eat the littler crabs.
 
I think that could be true of the smaller mantis. I'm waiting until one of mine gets bigger and then we'll see.
 
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