Wennerae and Corals?

[travisurfer]

Well, my recent mantis was lost during a bad molt last week. And, as depressing as it was, I am considering another one. I live in SE North Carolina so I may go out and collect my own. My last mantis was a G. graphurus and he was uber agressive so I couldn't keep any corals with him. I know N. wennerae are less agressive but do they leave corals alone? I know it sort of depends on the individual but I just don't feel like setting up a second tank again for the corals. Also, how apt are wennerae to strike the hand that feeds them?

 

[yankeereefer]

Wow trav - Sorry to hear about cozmo - I thought something was up - I noticed you post here and I saw an update to your NR thread (hadn't read either till now) - You haven't been here in a while

You may remember that the Colonel is a wenn - He's got a kenya tree, zoas, musrooms, gsp, hammer and frogspawn in his tank - He kicks sand up on the zoos periodically, but other than that he doesn't bother the coral.

He's not too aggressive towards me either - He'll smack the chopstick (when I feed) once in a while but most of the time he's pretty mellow (unless your a margarita snail, he loves them)

Good luck and again, my condolences

Ryan

 

[justinl]

hey there trav. My G. smithii (very similar to N. wennie) Trogdor is in an 8gal reef. zoos, palythoa, small monti, duncan, shrooms.

the only consideration i found was to make sure ALL frags are attached/glued to something the mantis can't move. like a piece of LR the size of the mantis. it also helps greatly to throw in a bit of LR rubble behind the rockwork so the mantis has building supplies if it neds it. Ive only ever lost a small colony of zoos to troggie but only because i was lazy and left the frag unglued. so that was purely my fault.

considering that they are mantids after all, small ones like N. wennerae are remarkably reef safe imo. like you said, depends greatly per individual.

Trogdor is pretty afraid of my hand, but i take lengths to not have my hand in there as much as possible. i frag outside the tank for example.

 

[travisurfer]

thanks guys. my frags are/were unglued for the most part. i'm still not sure if i'm going to get another mantis or a skunk cleaner shrimp at this point.

 

[justinl]

skunk cleaner?! come on travis my man, although skunks can crawl into your hand and pick at it, they're not even close to comparing with a mantis. they cant hit so fast that they cause cavitation bubbles! they cant show you the top of evolution in motion as they destroy small crabs in a flurry of chipped shell and raptoral appendages! they cant see with 16 (or was it 14...13? something ridiculously high compared to the three we have) bloody colour pigments! they certainly cant freak out visitors! they cant LEARN to identify you as an individual...

lol i just realised i may be a lil biased towards these guys. what can i say? i love em.

 

[travisurfer]

lol, i love 'em too. the one thing i have to consider is that a mantis also requires more special feedings, etc. and i have a tough school year coming up. it may be best to put a mantis on hold right now.

 

[justinl]

lol Im in university right now so I can totally understand where you're coming from... tanks are a lot of work.

personally i find mantids really easy to care for. drop in a krill every couple of days. take a few pics to appease the picture lovers on boards D). that's about it really.

 

[travisurfer]

lol, justin, its the special feedings on a skewer that can get quite sporadic and difficult. i think it may be best to just get the shrimp so i just have to throw some pellets/mysis in twice a week.

 

[yankeereefer]

Well, maybe sometime you'll see fit to care for another mantis.

Good luck with whatever you ultimately decide to do

YR