Coral Banded Shrimp

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fijiwigi

fijiwigi

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I saw a Coral banded Shrimp at the LFS today http://www.pieraquarium.org/resource/dynamic/global/coralbandedshrimp2.jpg
And I was wondering if it would be ok to buy for my 46g reef tank as an addition to my cleanup crew. I have Ocellaris clownfish and I recently got a 3 stripe Damsel. with some snails and a sally lightfoot crab. I am going to add a bullet goby fighting conch and more snails here pretty soon and am wondering if this is a good choice for a cleaner shrimp or if there is a better choice out there.
 
I would suggest a Skunk Cleaner instead... Coral Banded have been known to be a bit on the aggressive side, though it does depend on the shrimp, some have them and they cause no harm, others have experiences were the shrimp eats the fish.
 
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Just be careful and make sure you see the mandarin eat before you get it. Alot of them feed only on pods and will starve to death when they run out. If you see it eat other foods then you are good to go.
 
IMO your tank is too small and too new for a Mandarin. Almost all of them feed only on live pods (copepods and amphipods). It takes a tank of about 75g or larger with lots of lr and lr rubble to grow a large enough pod population for a mandarin. Most of them starve to death over a period of months in smaller tanks.
 
Shrimp: skunk cleaner - fun guy with lots of personality. Very passive, plays well with others.

Manadarin: what the others said. Do your research and I think you'll decide against it.
Callionymids
 
FWIW you'll really love the skunk cleaner shrimp. Mine climbs all over my hand when I'm playing inside the tank. They're a scream to watch when they clean other fish too.
 
cmor1701d said:
IMO your tank is too small and too new for a Mandarin. Almost all of them feed only on live pods (copepods and amphipods). It takes a tank of about 75g or larger with lots of lr and lr rubble to grow a large enough pod population for a mandarin. Most of them starve to death over a period of months in smaller tanks.
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I knew my tank was most likely too new just thinking ahead about my stocking plan. Too small as well i am sure I would really like an exotic and impressive fish I am sure that will probably have to wait until I get the urge to refinance my house and go for a 200+gallon setup. Just curious about things.
 
MsBeanCtr said:
FWIW you'll really love the skunk cleaner shrimp. Mine climbs all over my hand when I'm playing inside the tank. They're a scream to watch when they clean other fish too.
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Doesn't it kinda creep you out having a shrimp crawling all over your hand. Maybe you could teach it to play fetch and roll over (LOL) skunk cleaner sounds like a great idea. I May give it a shot. Will it get along with my sally lightfoot crab. And how do the relate to gobys>?
 
fijiwigi said:
Doesn't it kinda creep you out having a shrimp crawling all over your hand. Maybe you could teach it to play fetch and roll over (LOL) skunk cleaner sounds like a great idea. I May give it a shot. Will it get along with my sally lightfoot crab. And how do the relate to gobys>?
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You'll have to wait for one of the brains here to chime in on the combatibility of the sally lightfoot crab and skunk (cleaner) shrimp. My shrimp got along great with my watchman goby.

It absolutely creeps my son out when the shrimp crawls on him but my daughter thinks it's a hoot! Once you see the personalities of the shrimps it doesn't bother you as much as you might think. Like I said before, it's really neat to watch them clean the various fish too.

My shrimp waits for the fish to swim just close enough and then he launches himself at them. I've seen him darn near ride my yellow tang for half of the length of my tank. Also, when a fish isn't quite close enough to him he'll start rocking back and forth to "lure" them in (hence the name "Elvis" for my shrimp).

Gosh, can you tell I really like this guy? :lol:
 
I don't thnk you'll have any problems with a cleaner shrimp and the crab. There is no bonding relationship between a skunk cleaner and a goby. They'll ignore each other.
My cleaner sometimes pinches my cuticles. That can hurt at times. Usually it just crawls around my hand or arm looking for tidbits.
 
Crabs are, by nature, aggressive in my opinion. Keeping large crabs (i.e. Sally's) around with a-n-y-t-h-i-n-g that sits on the bottom for extended periods is risky. It's anyone's guess how a Sally would interact with a Peppermint, Blood Red, Cleaner, etc.. but provided the tank is large enough I would think they could get along just fine...

In my opinion, Sally's are a no-no for reef tanks anyways. The certainly do consume Coraline algae and their impact on other corals is also debatable..
 
Biggen said:
Crabs are, by nature, aggressive in my opinion. Keeping large crabs (i.e. Sally's) around with a-n-y-t-h-i-n-g that sits on the bottom for extended periods is risky. It's anyone's guess how a Sally would interact with a Peppermint, Blood Red, Cleaner, etc.. but provided the tank is large enough I would think they could get along just fine...

In my opinion, Sally's are a no-no for reef tanks anyways. The certainly do consume Coraline algae and their impact on other corals is also debatable..
Click to expand...
Its a 46g tank I really like the sally lightfoot crab. Hopefully there are not issues. I guess I will see how it goes.
 
I agree on not keeping any crabs in a tank. That goes for hermits too. I'm in the minority here, but we are each entitled to our own slice of the ocean..
 
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