Mantis Shrimp?

[phastroh]

Ok so I have always thought I had 1 Mantis and then I saw one and heard another so I was like ok there is 2.

I decided to take the 160 Pounds of rock out of my 80 Gal tank last night and only put back half of them so I could have a more open tank and finally give my coral some bed to sit on and man I have to say wow it feels so roomy but now I have 2 5 gallon buckets filled to the max with live rock.

I figure I will let it dry out till I get my new tank. I made sure I put back the live rock that came live and basically left out the base rock which was just getting live now.

Anyway this isn't about that. In the process I was determined to get the Mantis 1 or 2 out but what went on was shocking to say the least.

I started taking out the rock and actually found small stone/gorilla crabs. I was 100% I got them all and have never seen any for month. We got maybe 5-8 new ones out but man they were tiny. I figure anything left is dead already in the drying rock now. I can't let all the rock I wanted to keep dry over night or bye bye too much bacteria and the 8 fish I have will be in trouble.

Ok so I was searching for a big Mantis. I always here small pops and occasionally I have heard loud ones but no so much on the loud ones anymore.

So I had no found anything and the whole right side of my tank was Crushed Coral at this point as I didn't have warm salt water made to store all the rocks at once as I started this on a whim. I had enough saltwater sitting there and RO water to work though in sections.

So I am leveling the CC on the right side and I feel like a little pop in the glass right on my arm. I look and it is just CC so I get down and look by the front and there is nothing but I hear the clicks. I decide to scoop up the front rubble of stuff and in the net is a super tiny little green dude clicking the CC.

So as we proceed we end up finding a red one some clear and black ones but they all look the same. I thought maybe some were pods but they all click like a Mantis and you can here even these tiny tiny things from outside the tank.

I used my RO to power flush them because I have a storage tank that build pressure.

So I had them all in a red plastic cup and snapped some photos for you to comment on and confirm what they are. If they aren't baby Mantis then they are something that looks and click like them.

Never found a large Mantis.

I was thinking that when I got my new tank I would cycle it with the rocks I have drying that are base rock and will be void of any pests then dry these live rocks to kill any pests I missed and then place them in the tank last. Even if they dry for 2-3 days they will still be colorful they just wont have bacteria and pests like Mantis's hiding in them.

There are some crabs and maybe a pod in the cup as well.

Any thoughts?

 

[BL1]

I can't tell all of them on my phone but it looks like your got a lot of pistol shrimp in that container.

 

[wontonflip]

Holy moley :D I'm always amazed what people find! Are you gonna try to give those to the lfs or just toss them?

Don't you have a sump? No room to put in your unused rocks to keep them live?

 

[phastroh]

Where would they come from. I never had a pistol shrimp in the tank.

I saw a Mantis myself but I think I killed it sort of on accident trying to chase it.

 

[BL1]

They came from your rock, just because you never saw them doesn't mean they weren't there.

 

[phastroh]

Holy moley :D I'm always amazed what people find! Are you gonna try to give those to the lfs or just toss them?

Don't you have a sump? No room to put in your unused rocks to keep them live?

No, the unused rock is sitting high and dry and I could not save them because I had to pour the saltwater I sat the rocks in back into the tank because with less rocks and all the water lost it was real low on water, like not enough to restart the tank low.

 

[phastroh]

They came from your rock, just because you never saw them doesn't mean they weren't there.

But so tiny?

They look like newborns, the rocks has been in the tank for almost 6 months now.

 

[Dana42078]

Yea those look like pistol shrimp. Still "click" but not like a mantis ;)

 

[phastroh]

Man how can they be so small after 6 months. I was thinking maybe the Mantis I saw was a pistol but it was a rainbow colored Mantis.

I just thought they looked too small to have been in there for so long.

 

[Dana42078]

I woulda took all thos shrimps and crabs, to bad u arent closer. Lost of food there for my mantis lol

 

[phastroh]

See now if I had a Mantis wouldn't it have eaten all those things over time.

I have heard loud pops and saw the darn thing but I have never seen it since I thought I stabbed it. It was not on purpose. I was trying to chase it but it didn't move. I never saw it but maybe it died later on.

After having all the rock out and hearing loud pops where there was no rocks I am convinced it is these things.

A while back I saw a purple Mantis like 1-2 inches long but not fat at all. Never saw it again. The one I think I stabbed was Green and mulit-colored.

I am going to make a thread about my rock and the rock I took out here in a minute and slap it under New to Reefing.

 

[Dana42078]

A mantis would have def killed them. Well mine def would have lol

 

[little_fish]

I caution you about your idea of leaving your stuff outside for a few days, because that will kill everything on them, and unless you remove all that dead stuff its going to cause a HUGE cycle in your new tank.

They stuff that you are drying out right now, i would make sure you scrub the dead stuff off really well before putting it into the new tank so that it wont take as long to cycle, and you start will less algae fuel in the tank.

And i suspect that all those guys came in as larva and have just grown over the past 6 months. Cool finds though.

 

[ErinCahir]

+1 Hannah.

 

[Dannyrb26]

i find thousands of them where i live including 1 that gets close to 20cms long bright orange and furry we call them clicker shrimp here

 

[Northstar24]

Those all looked like pistol shrimp to me, not mantis shrimp.

 

[phastroh]

I caution you about your idea of leaving your stuff outside for a few days, because that will kill everything on them, and unless you remove all that dead stuff its going to cause a HUGE cycle in your new tank.

They stuff that you are drying out right now, i would make sure you scrub the dead stuff off really well before putting it into the new tank so that it wont take as long to cycle, and you start will less algae fuel in the tank.

And i suspect that all those guys came in as larva and have just grown over the past 6 months. Cool finds though.

The rock I am leaving outside will not be put back into a tank until I get the new tank.

I will be cycling the new tank just like a new tank with those rocks.

The rocks I left in my tank I have now I will do the same with but the problem is that this is the nicer non base looking rock.

My big thing is this. What will die first, the pests or the bacteria and how long for each?

I can always let it dry out for a day or so and just add one piece back at a time every 3-5 days and try to not get a cycle going.

I figure if the rock I took out that is drying is sitting for a month or 2 there is now way anything will be on that stuff dead or alive. Well I know some bacteria may still be deep inside. At least that is what I thought I read.

So yeah I am getting all new sand and this rock to do my cycle with Dr. Tims One and Only. I want to be able to take it slow and plan my layout with my corals and stuff.

 

[d2mini]

Man how can they be so small after 6 months. I was thinking maybe the Mantis I saw was a pistol but it was a rainbow colored Mantis.

I just thought they looked too small to have been in there for so long.

Those are all pistols and crabs.
Pistols are small compared to Mantis, and they mostly stay hidden in the rock's nooks and crannies. Harmless, but i did remove a bunch of mine from the first batch of tbs rock along with some gorilla crabs. The gorilla crabs are the worst imho, but easy enough to catch once they are big enough to be a problem.

 

[little_fish]

The bacteria is going to die before anything else does. And then you are going to put dead material in to your tank for it to rot there and cause endless issues. The rocks im talking about are the ones you were thinking of leaving outside the water for a couple of days to try and get rid of the pests, and then moving them right over to your new tank with the other cycled rock already in it. Even if you did this one rock at a time i think you are going to end up with huge issues.

I am not talking about the rock you are leaving outside for two months, that stuff will be totally dead, and hopefully destroyed enough not to rot when it gets wet again. Personally i would scrub the hell out of them anyways to remove as much as possible.

 

[phastroh]

So what should I do about the rocks I am using now then. I mean do I have an hour per rock at least to search and put in soda water and dunk in RO water with no issues.

I mean I did that to all the rock this time and so far so good.