Strange behavior....

[john76]

I moved all of the contents of my mantis tank to a new 20 long after the 10 gallon cracked. Since then my mantis has moved out of the rockwork and in to a large mexican turbo snail shell. It's really a blessing since the shell is right in front of the rockwork in plain sight. Makes it easy to feed him.

Here's the weird part. He has run around collecting all of the empty nassarius shells from the previous tank. I just dumped them in with the substrate thinking it didn't matter if I threw them away or not. Well, he found them and is making a mound of them in front of his mexican snail shell abode. There are also a couple new shells from hermits he's taken.

The only reasons I can think of were:

-there was left over snail flesh in the shells for him to eat and he tossed them out as usual after finishing them off

or

-he's trying to make a barricade with them in front of his shell

or

-he's laying a trap for the micro hermits and other nassarius snails, they may come picking at the scraps and get snatched up

BTW... I'm pretty sure it's an N. Wenn since he's from TBS rock

 

[opihi]

Re: Strange behavior....

-he's trying to make a barricade with them in front of his shell

that would be my guess. my n. wennerae likes to barricade himself in as well at times.

 

[ReneX]

My N. wennerae likes small shells and larger chunks of solid substrate as building materials, to shore up a sandy den or block the entrance at night. It's really entertaining to watch them shift it around in the front entrance for an hour or so, trying to get juuuust the right fit while they hold the piece in their maxilipeds!

 

[john76]

You guys were right about making a barricade. As of last night he collected every extra shell in the tank. I watched him try each shell trying to fit them in to the entrance of his hole. He ended up using a couple shells and some crushed coral to fit them in perfectly. The rest of the unused shells are in a mound in the front of it. So if any hermits need shells they are gonna have to come right in front of his lair to get them.

I'll post a pic later.