I have a 75 gallon tank with 150 lbs live rock and 75 lbs live sand. My tank has been up and running since feb. with everything going great the last couple of months. I have a number of live corals as well. I returned from vacation to find a very large rock crab or gorilla crab, a mantis shrimp and a large thing 2-3" oval shaped thing that looks like a flat gray piece of rubber with eyes? Plus my fish apparently have a some ich. Any help would be great. Thank-you
Please Help!
- Thread starter JJP161
- Start date
Re: Please Help!
well for the ich water changes will help, also galic supliments may help often ich will come and go....
crab, get it out....
now the 3 inch flat grey thing.... hmmmm....
can you get a photo?
sounds to large for most kinds of flatworm.....
may be a nudibrach ?? (sp)
sea-hare ?
small ray ??
well for the ich water changes will help, also galic supliments may help often ich will come and go....
crab, get it out....
now the 3 inch flat grey thing.... hmmmm....
can you get a photo?
sounds to large for most kinds of flatworm.....
may be a nudibrach ?? (sp)
sea-hare ?
small ray ??
Ok, correction, it's a large Xanthid Rock Crab, very, very fast. The mantis is extremely fast and is tunneling through my rock left and right. Twice I've pulled rocks he was in and he escaped somehow. Also they both completely ignore any traps.
The rubber looking thing looks most like a gray flatworm, but I have only seen him twice at night when I suddenly turn lights on and then he seems to melt back into the rock. He moves fairly quick for what ever he is?
So I've lost 2 clown fish, 1 butterfly, 1 six line wrasse and 1 yellow goby disappear in the last 2 weeks. No sign of them or their remains. We had the ich once before and got rid of it but now it's back. Should we pull out the last 2 fish and treat in a hospital tank? How can I be sure the display tank is ich free? Last time we kept out the fish for 8 weeks and it still came back.
The rubber looking thing looks most like a gray flatworm, but I have only seen him twice at night when I suddenly turn lights on and then he seems to melt back into the rock. He moves fairly quick for what ever he is?
So I've lost 2 clown fish, 1 butterfly, 1 six line wrasse and 1 yellow goby disappear in the last 2 weeks. No sign of them or their remains. We had the ich once before and got rid of it but now it's back. Should we pull out the last 2 fish and treat in a hospital tank? How can I be sure the display tank is ich free? Last time we kept out the fish for 8 weeks and it still came back.
rlf_racing
New member
I wish you were closer, as I am always looking for more xanthid crabs for my tank. heck I would even take the mantis shrimp if you don't want it. I have three different types of rock crabs, a stone crab, and moon crab in my tank. Happy hunting 
Hmm.... flatworms do move fast when they want to, mostly I have seen / heard of ones that are small like 1/2 inch ... but it sounds like you have a large one.
some do go after corals. not sure which one you have.
ich:
in my exp it is really in the water all the time in a low level and healty fish tend not to have any signs of it.
if the water params get bad or the fish are stressed / ill then they become prone to it.
if you have a q-tank you can use one, in your main tank you would need to allow a MINIMUM of 8 weeks for all the cysts to die.
and make sure the fish are also free of them.
how bad is it?
I had a friend with a nasty tank and in about 2 months we had it looking good by lots of water chnages, galic and better diet.
What is galic and I found a product by Hikari called PraziPro? not sure if it's reef safe. This is really driving me crazy, the tanks looks amazing and I have all kinds of stuff growing on my rocks and the corals are doing very well, but I am losing inverts and fish like crazy and the mantis is digging holes through the rocks left and right.
Plus I was just chasing the Rock crab around trying to catch him and found a baby rock crab. Now how in the world did I end up with baby rocks crabs all of a sudden when as far as I can tell I only have the one in there.
Ok so as a plan, what do you think of the following and is there any other options/
1. get a couple of large trash cans and fill with saltwater
2. Set up hospital tank and move all corals, fish & inverts there
3. Remove rock from diplay tank, piece by piece searching for and removing the "bad guys"?
4. Replace all rock to display tank
5. Replace corals and inverts
6. Treat fish in hospital tank for 8 weeks
Plus I was just chasing the Rock crab around trying to catch him and found a baby rock crab. Now how in the world did I end up with baby rocks crabs all of a sudden when as far as I can tell I only have the one in there.
Ok so as a plan, what do you think of the following and is there any other options/
1. get a couple of large trash cans and fill with saltwater
2. Set up hospital tank and move all corals, fish & inverts there
3. Remove rock from diplay tank, piece by piece searching for and removing the "bad guys"?
4. Replace all rock to display tank
5. Replace corals and inverts
6. Treat fish in hospital tank for 8 weeks
well first my bad on spelling it's "Garlic" you can get liquid garlic suppliment from most stores that sell fish food. it will not "cure" the ich but will help give the fish a "boost"
yes setup some extra water etc.... and a q-tank but
I would just move the fish to the q-tank not the coral etc...
then ou can treat the fish and not stress the other things and if the ich seems bad you can use stronger treatments on the fish that you can not use on other stuff, two things you can do that will work on the fish are hypo-saline and copper each of which will kill other stuff.
the other life is not part of the ich cycle and to get rid of the ich in the main tank the main thing is time w/o fish.
but several water chnages with the trash cans can both help reduce the amount of ich in the water while it dies out and help you find and remove the crabs and mantis.
you might want to get a few air pumps and tubing and air stones
and depending on tank size 2 or more of the rubbermade 18 or 25 gallon tubs.
you can use them to hold some water and some rock and use the air stones to keep the water oxygenated.
that way you can give your self time to find the crabs and mantis, setup traps in the tubs etc....
I have found that it helps to go slow and let the crabs and mantis feel 'safe' and start coming out, then you can see which tub they are in and isolate them, swap out some rock till you know he is in that tub in that rock and then trap him.
sometimes then you can put a bait at one corner and the rock at the far corner and let him go to eat and pull the rock.
then you can net the crab or mantis and sell, move or whatever.
plan on taking time to do it and use that time to do any cleaning or planning for things you want to do.
Update: The live rock is spread over 5 tubs with airstones. Have found and removed 2 large rock crabs - aprox 15 -20 small ones. 3-4 baby pistol shrimps(not sure what they are), 4-5 bristle worms, 3-4 unknown worms. Unable to locate the mantis. Have only heard him once or twice in the last couple of days.
QT is up and running, will move fish in the morning. QT for 8 weeks.
When should I start moving rock back into DT and any tips on locating mantis. The seltzer water has not worked yet,
Thank-you
Joe
QT is up and running, will move fish in the morning. QT for 8 weeks.
When should I start moving rock back into DT and any tips on locating mantis. The seltzer water has not worked yet,
Thank-you
Joe
redwarrior77
New member
Very cool to hear about this, although sorry you're having to go through it! I was wondering about how to isolate and trap any nasties that might come. Good luck!
you do know the pistol shimp are ok guys to keep right?
worms, 99% to be good, let them be.
there are peanut worms, bristile worms, spagetti worms, tube worms and several others that are all cleanup crew guys.
also are you sure you have a mantis ? if you just hear a loud "POP" that may be the pistol shrimp, yes even a small one makes a VERY LOUD "POP" sound. I have one and only seen him 2 times in about 5 years, hides all the time and I was surprised how small he was...
divemonster
New member
There are 2 pistol shrimps (at least those are the ones I found when putting in the part 1 rock) popping away in my tank. One of them has molted. I'm hoping the other one is still around, it was less than 1" long.
Update: All the rock is back in the DT and the foxface and cardinal are in QT for the next 7-8 weeks. As for the mantis, I am sure as he was coming out to look at us and taking pieces of shrimp from us. But when we went grab him he went into hiding. I started pulling the rocks I knew he was in and he always escaped. So anyways apparently the soda water trick has no effect on him and he is back in the DT. Haven't seem him yet but still hear him pounding away.
We are going to swtich back to feeding him if we can locate him. Perhaps a fed mantis is a happy mantis? Thank-you every one I certainly appreciate all of your feedback.
Joe
We are going to swtich back to feeding him if we can locate him. Perhaps a fed mantis is a happy mantis? Thank-you every one I certainly appreciate all of your feedback.
Joe
