Baby Mantis?

[TrippAllen]

My tank has been fully set up now for about 2 months. When I woke yesterday morning, the side of my tank was covered in some type of larvae. At first we thought copepods, but these little guys were swimming around! Second thought, baby clown fish (we have two clowns). There were hundreds of them! By late afternoon, there were only about 50 left, and the idea of baby clowns was shot down when I watched the clowns dining on the babies. After getting the pictures out of the camera, they look like little shrimp. We had two peppermints in the tank, but I haven't seen then in a couple weeks and assumed they were dead. We do have 3 or 4 mantis in the tank still, so my assumption is they were baby mantis shrimp. Does anyone agree? We do have one slipper lobster in the tank as well.

 

[lionbacker54]

wow, that would be amazing. maybe you can post these pics on the mantis shrimp forum? there's a mantis shrimp professor there who can help ID the larvae.

 

[noahm]

Looks like mantis babies. Shouldn't worry though, I had a similar spawn event. They were all about 1/8"-3/16" and were out on the glass for a couple of nights. Never saw them again and haven't seen any small mantids running around so I assume they all ended up lunch. With a few fish and all the stuff in the rock, they don't stand much chance especially crowding the glass like sheep. Pretty cool to have happen though.

 

[liverock]

live food...

live food...

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=15557530#post15557530 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by noahm
Looks like mantis babies. Shouldn't worry though, I had a similar spawn event. They were all about 1/8"-3/16" and were out on the glass for a couple of nights. Never saw them again and haven't seen any small mantids running around so I assume they all ended up lunch. With a few fish and all the stuff in the rock, they don't stand much chance especially crowding the glass like sheep. Pretty cool to have happen though.

Yup

Mantis....great food for the tank, as they will not make it to the next stage, unless you are Dr. Roy Caldwell!

congrats, pop!
Richard TBS:rollface: :rollface: :rollface: