Adopt-a-mantis

V

vol_reefer

New member
After three years (off and on) of trying to catch the mantis in my display tank, I finally trapped him Saturday night.

110266voldemort_sm.jpg


He's actually a little bigger than the photo suggests because he was at a bit of an angle to the tape measure when I took that shot.

His name is Lord Voldemort because of all the souls he has claimed: a breeding pair of orchid dottybacks, a blue-spot jawfish, a lawnmower blennie, two neon gobies, and a couple cleaner shrimp. Needless to say, I'm glad he's outta there.

I'm not all that interested in keeping him - he'd need a small tank of his own, and Sarah seems convinced he's going to break out and live in the plumbing of our house, maybe coming out at night to prey on neighborhood cats. Would anyone here want to adopt him? No charge to a good home.

I know Tangboy was looking for a mantis around a month ago, but I dropped him a PM and an e-mail and haven't received any response, so it's first come, first served for anyone who is brave enough.

Jeff (vol_reefer)

P.S. Local pick-up, no shipping, unless I can't find anyone local. If I do end up shipping it'd have to be on recipient's dime.
 
lol I can't believe you finally caught him!!!!!! :D

I'm sure your Clean up crew is rejoicing!!!

Congrats!!! ;)
 
I might be interested in the mantis. Let me see if my wife can use the mantis for her classroom. Can you give me a few hours to see if she is interested?
 
Better be careful of these things -- you could get in trouble if children start going missing when your back is turned...
 
Mike posted first, so I'll wait for the confirmation from him. Tangboy replied a few minutes later, so if Mike doesn't take him, I think Voldemort will still have a new home.

Yes, Randy, there is much rejoicing across the land and sea. Things may get worse before they get better, though. The reason he's out of the tank is because my hippo tang appears to have ich. I put a couple neon gobies in there to try to take care of the problem, and watched in (perhaps predictable) horror as the mantis devoured them both in under an hour. That gave me new inspiration to trap him. But now I have to deal with the ich, which has gotten to the point where I probably should QT the tang. I can't figure out how he got it - there had been no new fish introdcutions to my tank in several months. Makes no sense. He's not going to be happy in a little 29 gal. QT tank, but I don't think I have much choice. My bigger concern is that if I don't let the tank go fallow with no fish (just about impossible to do with my tank), he's going to get it again as soon as I put him back in.

Gotta love this hobby...

Jeff
 
hijack: Jeff, have you considered a UV sterilizer for the tank and garlic treatment to the fish food?
 
It is a go. I will take him please. I know you want him gone ASAP so I will set up a tank tonight using old tank water and rubble.
When and how do you want me to get him? I have to teach tomorrow afternoon, in the field on Th., and teach again on Friday morning.
 
FWIW with fish that are healthy and well established it's normal for them to actually fight off the infection. I have a recipe I came up with that several in the MTRC have used with success. I have used it twice myself, with my old hippo no less. The only ingredient that actually has any efficacy against the ich is metronidazole. You can buy a Seachem powdered version over the counter or if you have any old Flagyl caplets (most likely 250 mg) laying around that is the same thing. I also add garlic basically for the voodoo and vitamins and omega 3's help as well. I typically add selcon and Zoe for the last 2. You just mix it all together and then add some freeze dried brine shrimp to soak it up. Feed twice a day till at least a week after signs are gone.
hth, Chris
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=12333512#post12333512 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by ct_vol
lol I can't believe you finally caught him!!!!!! :D

I'm sure your Clean up crew is rejoicing!!!

Congrats!!! ;)
Click to expand...

What he said :D
Great news!
 
Kafuda: Would tomorrow evening work, after you teach? If not, will you be at the meeting on Friday evening? I could hand Voldemort off to you there, and then others could check him out if they're curious.

Mel, Randy: I've never tried UV or ozone. Would you have any concerns about killing off whatever "good" life is in the water column that the corals might be feeding off of? My SPS are doing really well right now... I'd be reluctant to put them in jeopardy. Are either UV or ozone things that you run 24/7 indefinitely? Or do you just use them once in a while?

Chris: I like the idea about using the metroidazole. Is that something one of the LFSs carries? I assume it's reef-safe? I'm already soaking their food in garlic and selcon.

Anything that would keep me from havng to QT these fish in separate tanks and let the display go fallow would be really good. I think there's a very good chance they wouldn't survive the QT experience (especially if it came to having to QT my Regal angel). Right now, the tang is apparently completely unaffected by his ich - he eats like a horse, no drop in his activity level, and no rapid breathing.

I have the dual-edged sword of having a spouse who has become very interested in the tank, and when she sees something going wrong, she gets on RC and WWM and starts finding out what it is I need to do to fix the problem. So I've been getting the "why aren't you saving the fish" question, while my general inclination is to go slow and very carefully with anything having to do with the tank - especially when the collateral damage from the "fix" could be worse than the original problem. So if folks around here have had good experiences with some of these in-tank treatments, I'm all for trying them before going to the more extreme step of QT'ig all the fish.

There - I think I've completed the hijack of my own thread!

Jeff
 
You might be able to find it at an LFS. If I remember I had the Aquatic Critter in Nashville order mine. I would imagine CR or the Aquarium could order it for you. I just looked on a couple of online places and didn't see any, not sure why as I've seen it several places in the past. It is the Seachem brand. You should be able to just add that to the mixture you are feeding. It is very important to use freeze dried brine shrimp though, not freeze dried plankton/krill or any frozen food. The brine shrimp soaks it up much better. It will not have any effects in the tank as far as corals etc..... Just feed what the fish will eat. Seachem actually recommends using Focus as well to help the drug bind but IME the Focus is just a waste of $ and makes the mixture less palatable to the fish.
hth, Chris
 
Doesn't Flagyl kill anerobic bacteria? Couldn't that be detrimental to nitrate-reducing anerobic bacteria in a sand bed? I've used it often to kill bacteria and parasites in Panther chameleons in the past and it was quite rough on their digestive tracts.

Dave
 
Yes it's mainly used to kill anaerobic bacteria (thus it's use in stomach upset in mammals, not sure why it upset the chameleons GI tract, maybe disturbed the normal flora?) but it also has activity against protozoa. The other great thing about it is it's high systemic availability. In other words you can give it by mouth and it will go all over the fishes body. I have used it several times (for things other than my 2 bouts with ich) in a couple of different reef tanks (one for ~ 4 months for a persistent sore in a belus) and have never seen any ill effects. Neither had a true DSB though. Both had SSB's and both had live rock of course where some anaerobic bacteria do reside. It's one big side effect in mammals is neurotoxicity FWIW.
Chris

Edit: I think the concern with the DSB is a valid and logical one but to my knowledge I have never heard of anyone having a problem with that......and the recipe has been passed around MTRC quite a bit.
 
Last edited:
Hey,
I plan on coming to the meeting so I guess I will pick it up then if that is ok. I figure some people would like to hold Lord Voldemort in the palm of their hand and feel powerful.
 
Mike - Sounds great. I'll bring the mantis whose name must not be spoken on Friday. I've got him in a smallish (~3x5x7") food container right now. If you bring something similar, we can just pour him out into your container - that way we don't have to coordinate again to get my container back. I don't think plastic bags are such a good idea with a mantis - could poke through them, potentially.

Chris - you've convinced me. I'm going to see if I can hunt down some Flagyl/metronidazole in the morning. It's worth a shot for all the problems it could save me with the QT option. Thanks for the suggestion.

Jeff (vol_reefer)
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=12340627#post12340627 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by NeveSSL
Just out of curiosity, is this guy a spearer or a hitter? :)
Click to expand...

I think a smasher (hitter). At least that's how it looked when I've seen him kill.

I tried to i.d. him using the mantis i.d. page that Roy Caldwell at Berkeley has on his website, but I didn't have much luck. The only mantis there that is mentioned to have a whitish ring around a dark meral spot (see Voldemort's photo, above) is G. smithii, but that's a Pacific species, and I'm pretty sure Lord. V. came in on my LR from TBS.

Jeff
 
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