Mantis Shrimp

[Guest D33rex]

Well....I finally realized tonite what I have been catching rare glimpses of as it grows up for at least a year. I finally saw my bright ass, neon green mantis shrimpy tonite. It is a good 2+ inches (full grown length??)....and I think ive had it since it was 1/2 inch. Anyways it now seems to be getting bolder, which is bad I take it....I have only lost one green chromis lately, but I moved about 2 months ago so that was probably it.

I actually ran upstairs to get my camera as it had a stand-off with my coral banded, although when I came back it was gone and the coral banded was sitting where he always does.

My question is to what degree do I really need to be worried?....what extraction methods have other people done in getting them out? I know there are traps you can buy, and Ive heard the inside out 20oz soda bottle works. Any other ideas from experience?

And finally, I have heard that some people actually collect these guys, so if anybody wants him when and if I get him out lemme know.

[miller]

as far as being worried about it will start killing things as it gets bigger and gets a bigger apetite im not sure of good ways to catch them but if you do catch him ill take him off your hands if your not to far away

[Guest goblinshark]

yea, i wouldnt be to worried, its a Neogonodactlyus wennerae, common florida specis, max out at abot 2-3", theyre smashers, so they only really eat snails, crabs and shrimp, wont kill your fish. however, i would attempt to extract him, so he doesnt kill your coral banded. They sell mantis traps at some fish stores and also, if you can pinpoint his hole, you can jus remove the rock and soda him out. Currently i have two of this type so, im full. I would love to see other ppl keeping them, theyre very interesting and fairly smart.

[fishface]

I had a brownish one in my tank it was pretty small and I think that it was a smasher too. I found that it liked a specific hole in a piece of LR, and with my wife's help we tried flushing it out but that didn't work. Then I decided to just kill it and tried routing it out with a wire hangar. It popped out when I put the rock back, and off it went unharmed! Later on I determined that the hole was over 3 inches long and curvy.

 

I figured that I'm in for a whole tank breakdown, but my wife saw it lurking around about 20 minutes later. We managed (while screaming and hopping around like a bunch of nut cases) to corner it with standard nets and pulled it out. I was too scared to grab it with my hands, because apparently either type will turn your finger into either kabob -if it's a stabber, or hamburger if it's a smasher. I didn't test either theory. The mantis has the fastest strike speed of all land and sea animals.

 

I moved it to another tank but it didn't last. But it's kind of ironic to suddenly finding yourself hoping the "enemy" will eat a snail that you've put in the tank for it.

Anyway, see whether you can find it's lair. If it prefers a hole on LR, remove the whole thing and dump it in FW. I had fairly new LR that stiil has live mussels and things on it so I didn't wish to sacrifice those things. It's Florida aquacultered and it probably came in on it. The asian stuff is sprayed down to eliminate mantis and I think it loses tunicates, mussels etc when treated that way.

 

FF

[craby]

One simple way to catch it is to get a square tubber ware container, put smoe food in it & lay it on it's side in a corner of the tank near it's lair. Put a mag cleaner on the back of the container & wait. When the mantis goes into the container, move the mag cleaner to push the container to the corner.