Kindergarden reef club wants mantis shrimp BAD.

tgrupert

New member
I run a aquarium club at a local daycare place. the kids are about 3-6. when they heard about mantis shrimp they REALLY wanted one. I want to setup a system with several 5.5 gallon tanks. one would be a refugium and the rest would be small isolatiion tanks. At least one for a mantis shrimp.

there is a live bait store close to where I live and I can get crawfish for 25 cents each. should be fun to watch. anyone have anout sugestions?

some people seem to say that they are always breaking glass, others say it was just a few isolated incidances. should I go with plastic "critter keepers?"

If anyone has a mantis they could give up please let me know. Even if you live far away I may be able to pay shipping and a lot of the parents travel for bussiness so purhaps somthing could be worked out.

I am 19 and have been working with children with and without special needs as well adults with special needs for as long as I could work. This is a great job beacuase no matter what I need a hjob to pay for my tank, but the fact that I get paid to run tanks for these kids is a great situation where everyone wins. I have actually thought of starting a non for profit organisation that would run diffrent educational and recrational programs involving aquariums, aquaculture and other science related topics. however until I get non for profit status you can't get a tax write off for live stock donations :)

Even if you don't have a mantis you can give up a picture would be great. they have seen a lot of the ones on the board, but I'm sure they would love to coraspond with you guys.
 
Mantis

Mantis

Grupert I have 2 mantis currently. A 6" O. Scyllarus and a 3" Neognodactylus Wennerae (thanks to TStaut for that one). The N. Wennerae is a Tropical Atlantic species so you can probably get one for free from a LFS that sells large quantities of liverock. I have the larger peacock in an acrylic 15 gallon hex tank. Out of morbid curousity I have fed her snails occasionally and they do not last real long (she's regrowing one smasher but is still pretty effective) but she could defintely break 3/8 inch glass without too much effort im sure. One of the small ones I think would be fine in a 5.5 gallon (I set up the N. Wennerae in a 3.5 gallon long glass betta tank - just took the dividers out).

A refugium would be cool but my mantis I just threw assorted macro algaes in and she used them to cover up the entrances to her tunnels - very interesting. Though they deserve good care like any other critter going with a full blown fuge might be overkill.

Also since it's for a good cause I'll see about getting you one next time the LFS has one to pawn off on me.

Edit - I'll break out the canon this weekend and snap some pics of my mantis - feel free to use em for wahtever. Their is a sort of blurry but neat picture of mine charging in another thread or go to www.maast.org and look at my gallery.
 
I would have multiple small tanks all conected to one fuge. is anyone sucessful keeping several mantis together in one tank? the other idea is to create a fuge for the nano tank with a mantis. this makes the most scence to me right now because the light will be off during the day when people can wqatch it and on durring the night when the mantis hides.
 
tgrupert,

Make sure you "kid proof" the lid/cover as well as everything electrical. I would hate to deal with the parent of a child who stuck their hand in the tank and got clubbed.

My mantis only comes out during the day...you can see him close up his burrow every day around 6pm. I don't think that there are too many mantis readily available in the aquarium trade that are nocturnal.

HTH,

Ryan
 
Well, if it does happen, I can garentee the same kid wount do it again :)


I think you onlky need to see a mantis eat to know not to put your hand in. I plan on using egg crate to keep all things safe.
 
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