Sallylightfoot crabs

[Rich-n-poor]

ok i added a sally lightfoot crab and I have the following problem:

i have two linka stars in my tank one large and one small ...about two days after adding the sally the smaller one had been attacked by something (im not saying it was the sally but the timing is right)

it had several pieces of flesh nipped out of it and a small piece missing at the very end of his leg

since the attack it has been hiding curled up in a small ball uder various live rock over hangs but moves occassionally to another rock

I feed this tank very lightly so i have increased the feeding in case it was a matter of mere hunger aggression

the sally has taken up residence in the cave everyone liked in my pics so getting him out is an impossiblity

anyone have any expierence with sallys and or agression on their part ?

HELP I LOVE MY STARS !!!!!
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Honda CR-X

 

[polyp]

I witnessed my Sally go completely psycho on a newly added brittle star. Unless you're OK with minced up stars, I'd get the Sallys out.

 

[NoriMuncher]

I've got a sally that I almost removed because it makes a lot of threatening moves, but I realized he never hurts anything- just jabs claws at the fish and cleaner shrimp when they get too close. Don't have any stars though.

 

[sillingw]

one sally, one brittle and 2 linka stars, no problems at all, i do try to make sure that the sally is fed, he comes out whenever I feed the tank so it's fairly easy. So I guess it all depends on the personality of the individual sally, mine has doubled in size and it's kinda scary because he looks big enough to do serious damage, I also have a freind (who recommended sally lightfoot) who has had one in his tank for a long time with no problems. Don't know if it makes any difference, but we booth have large tanks that were pretty well established before the sally went in

 

[Rich-n-poor]

well I saw this one take a shot at one of my percs

that was it he had to go ive had these percs for over a year and I love them took him back to the LFS who gave me full credit on a royal gramma

I dont know if he was what attcked the small linka but im not chancing it I think maybe the tank size being 37 gallons and him being a large sally may have influenced it
the linka is acting strange hes curling his legs up over himself be he is still alive he had about 4 chunks nipped out of him but they are not large pieces i think he can recover man would i kill for a refugium right now

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Mercedes Benz B Class

 

[Nathan1]

I had two sally's but one crawled out of the tank and I found him a week later on the floor a few feet from the tank. Poor thing, he was all dried out and dead.

The other one is huge. It's about 5" from claw tip to claw tip. It constantly picks at the rocks. I think it eats some valonia bubble algae and my rocks are picked clean.

It is a scary creature though. Looks like a spider. I wouldn't like it to nip me with it's large pinchers!

I have not noticed it being aggressive though. The only thing was my coral banded shrimp lost a front pincher, but it grew back. Don't know who attacked it.

My sally lost one of it's mid legs once, but the next molt it was back, and I can't tell which leg it was that was lost! Don't ask me how they do that! How the heck do they do it?!!!

-Nathan

 

[fusion]

The only problem I had with mine is that it would eat my snails occasionally. I think this was due to me not target feeding the crab directly. It never seemed to bother my star. I wonder if it might just be coincidence here. Starfish "skin" is pretty tough when you get down to it. I don't think my old sally with it's small claws could have really done that much damage unless the star was deteriorating already.

Good luck....

 

[Rich-n-poor]

its not a matter of him deteriorated he was healthy only days before i took several photos on him on my website

37 gallon reef in progress

I have had the red linka over a year and the yellow one about 3 months

the sally was the biggest crustacean in this tank the only thing close to its size was a left handed hermit which had been with the red star for over a year and the yellow for several months

i dont think it was the hermits as they have all been together in the tank since it cycled with no ill effect

at any rate i got rid of the sally

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definition of a recession