Setup questions

Milhouse

New member
Ok, in the past I, like many others, have believed the only good bug was a dead one. I've probably caught two or three over the years......and proceeded to feed them to the fish. I was always interested in them though, but never had a place to put them. Now I'm thinking about setting up a tank just for a mantis shrimp. I have been thinking about setting up a 7g AGA bowfront tank. Originally, it was gonna be a nana reef with fish. Now I'm thinking of skipping the fish and going with a mantis in the reef. The only problem would be no clean up crew. How are you guys battling algae? Would a mantis be ok in this tank, obviously a small one? I would also LOVE to know a person or place selling them, and nice ones at that. I really don't want some boring brown one, but one that's as beautiful as it is deadly! Any info would be greatly appreciated.
 
7 gallon would be fine for a smaller mantis. I have a 6 gallon with a spearer. Check out the Dr.'s site here: http://www.blueboard.com/mantis/
I asked some similar questions on some previous threads you could check out, just check the threads from last month, there aren't too many of them.
I promise you will not be disappointed with having a mantis. I became a mantis keeper last month and I look at it more than my 120 gallon reef.
Jared
 
Philippine mantis are a very colorful smasher that reach a max size of 4". They look almost like a peacock mantis and their colors get very bright when fed a varied diet and kept in a tank with good water quality.
 
With our mantis shrimp I just put lots of small snails in the tank and some crabs(blue legged ones the small kind) and what he doesn't eat, cleans the tank. I just replace them every few weeks or so. I have a couple of bigger snails in there as well but he ends up killing them eventually too! So far I haven't had a problem with algae, hope this helps some what.
 
I'm still waivering on the whole idea, since the tank will be in my office. But a lot of the people I work with would LOVE the tank. I introduced some of them to mantis shrimp a long time ago. They really couldn't believe that they could hit with the force of a 22 caliber bullet. The only problem with the tank being at work would be.....its at work :). I might do it, but at home next to my computer. I was wondering if you got the real small blue leg crabs, would a manis bother those? I'm trying to figure out a cleanup crew since this will be a reef tank too. I figure I could get some detrivores like bristle worms and such, maybe some nassarius too(shouldn't bother those if they are burried in the sand). I just need to find some place online that sells them. Anyone have any ideas, or any people here that sell and ship nice mantis? I'm in CO.
 
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