AttackDonut
New member
Hi gang-
Last week, the hurricane knocked out power to my home, and with power still out, I lost my entire reef tank (I posted aboutit elsewhere)
I was pretty ticked and had decided to stop reefing altogether, but have since sort of changed my mind.
In any case, I rescued my 3 gallon modded eclipse tank, which has housed a deep purple mantis, various coral frags, and a very pretty damsel. It is now safely at work (where I have power and internet access)
I was able to rescue a few small frags from my main tank, along with some snails and hermit crabs and a very odd looking slug-like critter with an armadillo-style shell. All of these went into the 3 gallon.
Now the 3 gallon has housed, since the beginning, the mantis, some frags, the damsel, some hermit crabs and a few small snails.
As I put the new things in, the mantis (nicknamed "muddy" for all the dust he's constantly making smashing out new holes in the live rock) takes an interest, and *immediately* pounces on the new armadillo-thing.
*Crack!* *Crack!* *Crack!* goes his smashers against the shell of the armadillo slug. Now muddy isn't very big, perhaps 2 inches long, and the armadillo slug was half that size.
I say "was" because muddy managed to abscond with it into his lair where I could hear "*Crack!*" all throughout the workday.
Today I noticed him out with said slug, sans shell, and is merrily munching away on it.
The damsel is also darting in and biting off bits, with no reaction from Muddy.
I have also noticed that the new snails that were put in, have been eaten as well. Odd that he would leave the other tank mates alone and go for the newcomers.
I wish I could get a picture of him since his colour is unusual (all purple with green legs and blue/white meral spots) but he's very shy.
In any case, I'm glad he is alive, nothing like losing 3,000$ worth of reef tank and having a free mantis survive
Tough little guys aren't they?
As an aside, what are the odds, given a larger tank, of getting mantis to mate?
Last week, the hurricane knocked out power to my home, and with power still out, I lost my entire reef tank (I posted aboutit elsewhere)
I was pretty ticked and had decided to stop reefing altogether, but have since sort of changed my mind.
In any case, I rescued my 3 gallon modded eclipse tank, which has housed a deep purple mantis, various coral frags, and a very pretty damsel. It is now safely at work (where I have power and internet access)
I was able to rescue a few small frags from my main tank, along with some snails and hermit crabs and a very odd looking slug-like critter with an armadillo-style shell. All of these went into the 3 gallon.
Now the 3 gallon has housed, since the beginning, the mantis, some frags, the damsel, some hermit crabs and a few small snails.
As I put the new things in, the mantis (nicknamed "muddy" for all the dust he's constantly making smashing out new holes in the live rock) takes an interest, and *immediately* pounces on the new armadillo-thing.
*Crack!* *Crack!* *Crack!* goes his smashers against the shell of the armadillo slug. Now muddy isn't very big, perhaps 2 inches long, and the armadillo slug was half that size.
I say "was" because muddy managed to abscond with it into his lair where I could hear "*Crack!*" all throughout the workday.
Today I noticed him out with said slug, sans shell, and is merrily munching away on it.
The damsel is also darting in and biting off bits, with no reaction from Muddy.
I have also noticed that the new snails that were put in, have been eaten as well. Odd that he would leave the other tank mates alone and go for the newcomers.
I wish I could get a picture of him since his colour is unusual (all purple with green legs and blue/white meral spots) but he's very shy.
In any case, I'm glad he is alive, nothing like losing 3,000$ worth of reef tank and having a free mantis survive

As an aside, what are the odds, given a larger tank, of getting mantis to mate?