Please Help Me Trap an Unwanted Mantis

[ChrisBuono]

Please help me capture or kill the mantis shrimp in my tank.

My 92 gallon tank is less than two months old. I finished adding the remainder of my 175 total lbs. of LR only two weeks ago.

I've just begun to add a clean up crew. The new snails and hermit crabs have apparently lured my unwanted guest out of hiding. He's already killed at least a few.

He's about 2.5 inches in length.

So far I've tried to trap him in a DIY trap with a live snail and raw supermarket shrimp as bait. I'm not having any luck.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

He scares the crap out of my wife!

 

[sgolden]

send me a plane ticket.. i'll get him for you ...

 

[sandlot13]

stick with the homemade traps....... eventually he will go in it, just try to starve him for a few days and he will "hopefully" go right into the trap for the food. good luck, and if you want to send it to me, ill take it
!!!!

 

[Crawling68]

I thought you had one lined up already sandlot!

 

[sandlot13]

haha, ya! zurcsreef and I are trying to get it worked out (right now i believe hes attempting the task of catching the little beast!) but if i could get another one, id go buy another tank and set it up, haha. no, i think one is enough for now, but maybe in the future.........

 

[Crawling68]

Ya, i know how you feel. Im on the lookout for another one for my 40. I have the 12 with the Smithii right next to the computer, so im starting to get whiplash from looking back and forth.

 

[ChrisBuono]

So ends the saga of my evil mantis shrimp.

None of the traps worked. Lucifer (the mantis) just wouldn't come out far enough to enter any trap.

The winning method was a pair of cooking tongs and a small bit of raw shrimp as bait. He only needed to come out an inch or two. I waited with the tongs' arms on either side of his burrow, and snap. I got him.

I was worried that I'd hurt him by squeezing the tongs, but he seemed just fine.

I took the suggestions and brought him to my LFS. I was hoping, at worst, to find him a good home, at best, $40 credit.

Unfortunately, the jerk at the fish store decided he had no need for a mantis shrimp and quickly dropped him into the large trigger tank before I even realized what was going on.

Over the week that I knew Lucifer (my therapist says the first step to acceptance of such a thing is to name it) I had grown not to like him, but to respect and appreciate him (or her, who knows?).

I can't say I was very careful not to hurt Lucifer, but the thought of me hurting him unnecessarily weighed heavy on my mind. At last, I took good care and in transport made sure he made it to my LFS in good health.

All for what?

I feel bad for what happened. I did my best. I'm glad he's gone, but I wish the story had a different ending.

 

[Crawling68]

R.I.P. Lucifer