trying to get rid of a crab!!

Jnickles85

New member
I have a 24g tank and I have had a crab in my tank since I bought one piece of LR. I have tried the glass burried in the sand trick and I have also tried the water bottle trick, where you cut the top of the bottle off and flip it around and place it inside the bottle. As of yet still no luck. After seeing him again tonight he has gotten pretty big. His body is definitely the size of a U.S. dollar coin. Anyone have any ideas on how to get this guy out of my tank ? I am pretty sure he took out my other clown fish :/. Right now I have nothing in my tank but the rock about 19 snails and my single clown fish.
 
Is it only one piece of rock? If you know where he is pull it out and shoot club soda or ro water into its hole with a syringe. He may come running out.
 
No I have several pieces of rock in the tank, I actually thought about flushing them with RO water but I would have to remove them all :/
 
Don't bury the glass. Bait it (tall, smooth sided) with a bit of raw fish and tilt it against the rock work. Make sure the glass it taller than the crab's leg span.
 
Don't bury the glass. Bait it (tall, smooth sided) with a bit of raw fish and tilt it against the rock work. Make sure the glass it taller than the crab's leg span.

I'll try it again, nothing to lose.. Just need him out of my tank, hes getting very aggressive he jumps up at me when I come close to the tank.
 
If you know which rock he is in pull it out. Try the club soda thing in a plastic tub. You can also tilt the tub and put some water in it and the rock on the dryer side. The crab will probably go into the water after a while but you will get massive die off on the rock that way. If he is that aggressive it may be worth it.
 
If you know which rock he is in pull it out. Try the club soda thing in a plastic tub. You can also tilt the tub and put some water in it and the rock on the dryer side. The crab will probably go into the water after a while but you will get massive die off on the rock that way. If he is that aggressive it may be worth it.

Yea I really do not know the rock he is staying in. Right now I am trying to deal with the crab and a huge algae spike in my tank. I left for 4 days and I know I turned my light off before I left but when I returned home the light was on :facepalm::facepalm: so now I am trying to recover. Same time I have discovered that my RO filter has been leaking pretty bad because I have only changed my water about 15 times and my Resin is completely yellow.
 
I'll try it again, nothing to lose.. Just need him out of my tank, hes getting very aggressive he jumps up at me when I come close to the tank.

If he is jumping at you when close to the tank, then why not just net him out when you see him?
 
I would take the clown fish and snails out and put them in a bin or bucket with an air bubbler (for the clown fish).

I would siphon out around 5-8 gallons of the water (from the middle of the water column where it's clearest) and set it aside. Then I would empty the tank, scrub all the algae off the rocks using the old saltwater and a new stiff brush, remove the crab, clean the empty tank completely and reset the tank up with new saltwater and the aged saltwater you saved.

This should not take too long with a 24 gallon. Be sure that the new saltwater you add has been mixing for a day or two in a separate container.
 
I advise against that unless you're prepared to re-cycle with your fish in their qt tank for the next few weeks.
 
I advise against that unless you're prepared to re-cycle with your fish in their qt tank for the next few weeks.

Yeah I was also thinking the same thing. Right now I have my light back off and only really using it to feed my fish. I leave it on for about 2 hours. I also bought 10 more Margarita's. As soon as I get this crab out of the tank I'm going to try and get a fish that helps with the cleaning of rocks and or sandbed.
 
I advise against that unless you're prepared to re-cycle with your fish in their qt tank for the next few weeks.

I have broken down my 50 and 30 gallon fish and coral qt tanks several times, reset them up and they have never recycled.

Once empty, I wash the tanks outside with the hose, completely dry with a towel, clean all the heaters & pumps, add some water from my dt and refill the rest with new saltwater and they are good to go. If you have live sand you have to completely rinse it in saltwater before putting it back in.

I have also removed live rock before and scrubbed it clean with saltwater to get ahead of algae or cyano and it has worked well.

However, putting the one fish back in qt would be a good idea to be on the safe side.

Sometimes it's easier to do one big fix than to try to keep trying different things to solve a problem.
 
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