Do mantis eat bristleworms?

[Avalon_Princess]

I've been hearing some brief clicking in my tank just before I fall asleep the last few nights and have also found two dead inverts. The first was a tiny crab with no signs of actual harm/wounds just a dead crab and the second one was a three inch bristleworm that got cut into five separate pieces. I do have another small crab hanging out in the rockwork and something has been having a go at his cave and destroyed the outer walls, so the teeny hole I was peering through to see the crab is now an a long open corridor type thing. I think I could have a mantis, but have never heard of them eating bristleworms?

It'd actually be kinda cool if i have a mantis, much preferable to the 33cm worm I fished out.

 

[Tangalong]

I don't think they eat them....but if it was invading his burrow, he would definitely kill it. Good luck...hope you have one...what excitement that will be..

 

[351winsor]

I woke up saturday morning to my peppermint shrimp fumbling around a tiny bristleworm. Just an inch away my mantis was watching the whole thing go down, he darts over, the pep drops the b-worm, the mantis picks it up fumbles it around a bit, then tosses it?!?!? Just a few seconds later, the peppermint was eating the b-worm. I sat there wondering...If times get hard and food runs low, i bet a mantis will eat a bristleworm!

 

[Avalon_Princess]

Well casualties so far are a very small crab killed not eaten, a bristle worm cut into five pieces and a small bivalve with a very obvious hole in the middle, the shell was totally cleaned out. If this is a mantis I think it must be fairly small as there are some larger crabs that are in the rock, and although something has done some renovations to one of the crabs tunnels the crabs themselves are fine. Now and then at night I have also heard some clicks. The little piles of broken rock I keep finding suggest a mantis though, as I run a bare bottom tank the debris is obvious and this isn't shedding rock.

I've ordered a 12" cube so hopefully I can catch this mantis and move him to his own home, as I'm not big on having one rearranging corals LOL. Haven't seen anything though I tried setting a trap and baited with bloodworm and got no reaction, I'll try a bit of prawn tonight.

 

[Tangalong]

Boy, this is getting very interesting. When ever my mantis would eat a crab or snail (she liked the little blue or red hermits and margaritas...probably easier shells to smash) she would totally smash the shell in a LEAST 2 pieces...usually 3 or 4. I don't know what puts a little hole in the shell, unless it would be a spearer mantis. No one has ever brought this up...should be neat to hear what the others have seen.

As far as Mantis' eating bristleworms, I have never seen mine do it, but strange things happen around Stomatopods.lol

Please keep us posted...I love mysteries !!!!! By the way, where did your LR come from? Maybe we can figure out what you have or at least narrow down the type if it is a Mantis. Some on here are really good at ID'ing them.

 

[Avalon_Princess]

I'm fairly sure my LR came from Western Australia, however it had been in the LFS's tank for months so pretty much whatever it is would be local to Australia, but can't be narrowed down much further.

I've gotten two glimpes of whatever it is as it rounds corner dragging it's latest bit of prey. I was overjoyed to watch my eunicid worms severed head dissappear LOL, I did not like that worm, the tentacles really creeped me out. There didn't seem much destruction overnight but from what I could hear there was all out war raging, I kept hearing clicks, often double clicks spaced maybe 2-3 minutes apart and a couple ofr times the clicks changed in sound like it was hitting something else. I also found two small (5mm long) empty snail shells which I haven't seen before. Last Night I also saw this big puff of sand/detritis appear from beneath a rock, there is a spaghetti worm (I think about 20 long hair fine stripey tentacles that grab things and drag back to the centre) in that area but I don't think they'd give off big puffs of detritus.

I have a prawn head in the trap at the moment I'm trying not to leave any food in long enough for it rot just to keep control of water quality. I caught another bristleworm but no mantis.

Also my cowrie snail is fine and untouched, it's the only really large prey in the tank, I'll get some hermits/snails on the weekend and see what happens.

 

[Tangalong]

Can you move your Cowrie? They love snails...and a cowrie is a big snail isn't it? We used to collect those off the reef where we lived in the Marshall Islands when I was young..some were really pretty too...Imagine my surprise to see them used in aquariums.

 

[Avalon_Princess]

A cowrie is a snail, it's a type that has a really thick shell, they can be any size though mine is an inch long... I have nowhere to move it and no real intention of doing so it came a hitchhiker and to be honest I'd prefer the mantis eat that then the other critters in the tank. However the mantis just keeps pounding away at the crab burrow, though the crab is still alive and undamaged LOL.

 

[Avalon_Princess]

Well for the last few days apart from hearing a lot of clicking all seemed quiet on the shrimp front. I added a hermit crab which didn't seem to have much effect. However I just had a rockslide in my tank and once I'd gotten everything back together I noticed there were some new additions to me detritus pile. Three new worm heads and a dead crab. I don't know what the obsession with wormheads is, it took the eunicid worms head as well, though unfortunately didn't kill the worm.

I've tried to sneak up on the tank, leaving it dark then flashing a torch on it at midnight but so far have only seen lots of worms and amphipods nothing that could be doing this sort of damage.

 

[Avalon_Princess]

Make that two small dead crabs, three worm heads and a dissected 5" bristleworm. The chopped up worm 'could' have been the hermit crab but the worm would have had at least the same body mass as the hermit so kind of doubtful.

There's something in the rock that periodically sends out clouds of debris into the water, could that be a mantis/pistol working on their home?

 

[dipan]

Ever figure this mystery out?

 

[Raggamuffin]

hehe I am sitting in the same situation, except I am actually watching one mantis a fair bit. The clicking sound got me looking but it's comming from 3 or 4 diffrent spots and each spot has a hole... I figured it out because of a puff of dust under a rock at night and went and looked and spotted a 3 inch mantis.

 

[Avalon_Princess]

It ended up being a combination of things. I had a bacteria die off that killed off a lot of inverts, including two inch long pistol shrimp (one with eggs) all awesomely zebra striped, and the reall culprit a 6 inch eunice worm.

 

[peasofme]

definitely sounds like a mantis. eunice worms are real bad

 

[criswallace]

my peacock ate a large bristle worm that was half dead last night

 

[peasofme]

do you know why the worm was half dead?

 

[criswallace]

cause i cut it half trying to move it to his tank