What thickness glass can a peacock be kept in?

[NALCOMIS]

I have a 65 gallon reef ready thats sitting empty, I would rather use it than buy a seperate acrylic tank for it. Its about 1/3" thick.

sam

 

[Gonodactylus]

It depends on the size of the animal. A standard 60 gal should be able to hold a 5-6 inch O. scyllarus. The very largest O. s might be able to chip a corner of bottom edge, but even that is very unlikely. I wouldn't worry about it.

Roy

 

[NALCOMIS]

Do you think piling up sand or rocks in the corners would lesen the chance of damage?

I dont understand how a such small crustacean could inflict enough pressure to damage 1/4-1/3" glass. Of course I take your word for it, but still pretty amazing.

 

[Gonodactylus]

Actually, piling material in the corners is probably a bad idea. It will promote digging and this is where the problem usually starts. The animal starts to construct a burrow, hits the corner and does what it does in the field when it hits an obstruction that it can't move. It tries to break it or knock it free. In a tank, strikes that land on the edge of the glass occasionally chip it and this can lead to a leak. I want to stress that this is very, very rare and usually only happens with the largest smashing species - O. sycllarus and Hemisquilla. However, I have had it happen to me a few times. If I'm worried about a particularly large animal causing problems, I plase a thin strip of plexiglass around the bottom of the tank. This does the trick. Before you set up the tank, you can also use a larg bead of silicone around the inside edge. That also works

As far as how they can break something, Sheila Patak and I have been studying the biomechanics for a few years. If you are interested, try looking at Sheila's webside: http://ist-socrates.berkeley.edu/~patek/shrimpMechanics/index.htm

Roy

 

[NALCOMIS]

Very intersting!

Thanks,

sam