ANY chance of a coral-banded shrimp eating a small fish???

[Anonymous]

Hi all


I have a 72 gallon reef.

I love my firefish like a "real" pet. Dogs, cats, and Flicker the firefish. :lol:

I am restocking some inverts and I'm thinking about a coral banded shrimp. Is there even a 1% chance of a coral banded eating a healthy fish while it sleeps? If so, no shrimp, as I don't want to risk Flicker's life for any silly shrimp.

Please give me your experiences with this animal...are they agressive toward fish tankmates? towards other shrimp, like cleaner shrimp? Towards hermit crabs?

I'm sure most will say no, but I'm looking for the one case that says yes because of my evil :evil: peppermint shrimp that murdered and consumed it's fellow pep and a cleaner shrimp right before my eyes before I caught it and threw it in the bay. :twisted: No one has ever toild me about an evil twisted killing peppermint shrimp, but I will never get one again because of this one....so has anyone had an evil coral banded?


Thanks

 

[Anonymous]

Are you sure it was a peppermint and not a camel? IME, L. wurdemanni is completely peaceful to conspecifics. CBS are much more aggressive to other shrimp than any Lysmata species that I've had in my tanks. FWIW, the wholesalers I've been at all keep their Lysmata shrimps in the same tanks together, but keep CBS in separate cubicles.

 

[Anonymous]

Are you sure it was a peppermint and not a camel? IME, L. wurdemanni is completely peaceful to conspecifics. CBS are much more aggressive to other shrimp than any Lysmata species that I've had in my tanks. FWIW, the wholesalers I've been at all keep their Lysmata shrimps in the same tanks together, but keep CBS in separate cubicles.

It's funny that every time I tell someone about that evil bastard, they propose that I had a camel back. I have seen pictures of both species and they are, at least they appear to be in pictures, quite different looking and easy to tell apart. I showed a picture of him right before he was "set free" on another forum and the consensus was that he was most certainly not a camel back.

The only non pep like characteristic he had was the huge size he reached...much larger than a peppermint should get. He was double the size of his "mate" which looked identical to him...that was the point at which he ate his mate. I witnessed the horrific sceen. He tore a perfectly healthy shrimp apart before I could grab a stick and stop him. After it was too late, I let him eat his mate, which is what he did.

Then two weeks later he turned on a large skunk cleaner and tore him apart, also right before my eyes...as if taunting me to catch him and stop his murder spree.

In order to save my last remaining cleaner I spend a week and a half watching a plastic container bated with his favorite food....shrimp! :evil: I finally caught him and took several pictures of him before getting rid of him.

He was absolutely a pep...although I suspect he may have been some sort of sub-species because of his size, there is no way he was a camel back.


I also forgot to mention that i witnessed him killing a blue linkia star, which never recovered from the injuries he inflicted on it, and he killed two large trochus snails and sever turbos, which he tore out of their shells part by part.

I think that the animal kingdom must have its psychopaths, just like we do. 8O

 

[npaden]

That really is odd behaviour for a peppermint shrimp, but the behaviour you are describing sounds like several stories about coral banded shrimp I've heard. Just think of how much more powerful the claws on the coral banded would be than a peppermint. I wouldn't recommend a coral banded shrimp for anyone with small fish or other small mobile inverts.

FWIW, Nathan

 

[Anonymous]

Thank you Nathan,

I think I'll stay away from it. I'll just stick to good old peaceful skunk cleaners.

 

[baseman]

Manny- thanks for bringing this up. I was going to add a couple of Peps. to my tank, but I have a purple firefish in there now (absolutely beautiful), and I wouldn't want any renegade shrimp to do anything to him. And I'll definately stay away from the coral banded shrimp.

 

[Anonymous]

Coral banded are clumsy and sort of slow but they will occasionally catch sleeping / slow fish and can be hell on other shrimp in small quarters. Additionally they get big - I've seen them 8" or more in length. Peppermints - at least the Carribean / Gulf variety are very very low key IMO - sessile invertebrates may get pestered occasionally but I seriously doubt they could harm any fish that was healthy.

 

[Anonymous]

Lysmata wurdemanni has never demonstrated this behavior in all my years of experience with these creatures. A Coral Banded, however, could be practically guaranteed to be a problem, especially compared to the classical peppermint shrimp.

 

[Anonymous]

I had a coral banded quite a while go, in my nano with a domino, he ate the domino's tail off!!

I guess the little SOB got hungry, the shrimp went back to the lfs, and the domino died a few days later

 

[PopeShawnPaul]

My Coral Banded Shrimp was a nasty bugger. I caught him killing my watchman goby, and later grabbing my clown fish. What's funny, he didn't even hide it. As soon as he was in the tank, I caught him stalking my less mobile fish... I even fed him well, in hopes of keeping him happy. He had to go.

P.S. - I've heard some don't touch a thing. Possibly smaller sized ones give you a better chance.

 

[Anonymous]

Thing is, with CBs, you pretty much have to count on this behavior. Plus, feeding 'em well ensures great growth, and when they get big....

 

[Anonymous]

Just a coincidence to show that peps are not always as docile as people say they are.

I was in my LFS yesterday...after we had been discussing this peppermint thing, and the subject came up. One of the young guys that works there, in his early 20s but he has a lot of experience and he farms softies in several large tanks at home, claimed to have had an evil pep also (not a camle back).

He also said that all 5 times he added peps to take care of aiptasia, they ended up killing eachother off one by one. I have never heard that peps tend to kill eachother off...I have always read they are peacefull shrimp. However, I don't think this guy was lying, and I know that my shrimp was most certainly not a camel back. So maybe this is not as uncommon as some think.


Either way, I won't take a chance with Flicker the firefish's life. :lol: