hickncali Posted November 21, 2003 Share Posted November 21, 2003 last night i was wondering around the lfs and just happend to see a could of dust fly out of one of the rocks in their coral tank. So like the idiot i am i decied to stair into in it just to see what it was. Next thing I knew these two little beedy eyes were poking out of the hole stairing right back at me. After i thought for a bit i realized it was a mantis shrimp, the one thing all of us hate to have in our tanks. So I went to one of the employee's and asked if i could have it and they responded with a "NO, we dont have mantis shrimps." I ended up getting the shrimp for free and the rock he was in for $5. I threw him in the sump last night and i am now starting making his new home from a 1 gal tank i found at petco for $15. Came with incandesent light, air pump, undergravel filter system and some plastic plant i will prolly toss. Here is a pick of his new home straight out of the box with fresh water in it. Link to comment
hickncali Posted November 21, 2003 Author Share Posted November 21, 2003 i plan on putting some live sand from my 30gal tank on the bottom, mounting the little plastic tube in the back corner and pump air threw it kinda like the german style micro reef's,putting some sort of little tube for him to live in. Also i have a extra light from those little betta tanks that i will break apart and mount under the hood. Maybe in a few weeks i will add one of my million kenia tree frags that I have. If you have any ideas post them, i would like to hear what ya think about it or any advice. Link to comment
dickie52 Posted November 21, 2003 Share Posted November 21, 2003 how did ya get the mantis out of the rock ? Link to comment
hickncali Posted November 21, 2003 Author Share Posted November 21, 2003 well i have yet to flush him out of his little home as of yet. I plan on doing dip in water with a much lower salinity, almost like a fresh water dip but not as intesive. Oh and i have seen his entire length, he's smaller than an inch. Any other ideas on how to get him out of their if that dont work? Link to comment
ngericke Posted November 21, 2003 Share Posted November 21, 2003 put a small piece of shrimp on the opposite end of the tank --and be quick He will come out eventually Link to comment
hickncali Posted November 21, 2003 Author Share Posted November 21, 2003 i aint that quick, this little sucker is speedy i tried to do that earlier, now when ever i stick my hand above the sump he hides deep in his hole. Link to comment
ngericke Posted November 21, 2003 Share Posted November 21, 2003 tie some fishing line top the rock and yank Link to comment
hickncali Posted November 21, 2003 Author Share Posted November 21, 2003 hmm, sounds like an idea, never would of thought about that. But right now im in the process of building his new home. i gotta replace his old lights with pc in the stock hood. once i finish all this i will put a post in the DIY part of the board showing how i did my lights Link to comment
Pigup Posted November 21, 2003 Share Posted November 21, 2003 what has worked for me is...finding a bucket in which the rock fits snugly, then fill it with tank water, put the rock in and wait...i've found that the sucker will jump out and crawl around the bottom of the bucket...you just have to pull the rock out. Link to comment
z6joker9 Posted November 21, 2003 Share Posted November 21, 2003 we sell that same tank at petsmart for 10.99 nice find. the mantis shrimps you find for sale are usually not cheap. Link to comment
hickncali Posted November 21, 2003 Author Share Posted November 21, 2003 well what i ended up doing was taking a around 1gal of tank water and put it into a bucket, this was also going to be the water that would be gonig into his new little home. Took the rock that he was in, held it just above the water in the bucket and poured a little bit of RO water and out he came. I was going to take a pic of him but everytime i try to he turns and sticks his butt im my direction. I know that they are supposed to be smart, but know what a camera is and mooning. I think im dealing with a higher form of intelegence:P Link to comment
hickncali Posted November 21, 2003 Author Share Posted November 21, 2003 crap i could of had the cheapest tank i have ever set up. Well it still is, but it could of been cheaper. oh well Link to comment
OneOfDaZZZ Posted November 21, 2003 Share Posted November 21, 2003 I have that exact same tank at home. My wife used it to play with guppies. I was thinking about taking it to work and making a small nano with a custom hood with a 13w 50/50. 13w per gallon should strong enough to have some fun with. Link to comment
skylsdale Posted November 21, 2003 Share Posted November 21, 2003 What are you going to cover the heater with....black PVC? Link to comment
hickncali Posted November 21, 2003 Author Share Posted November 21, 2003 yea it should be, right now i have a 9w 7500k pc over the tank and its really looking good, but 13w 50/50 that'll look great. Post some pic of it i would really like to see the hood that you end up building for this little tank. Im not that good with wood so i just retor fited a 9w from one of those betta tankis and it looks just as clean as it did when i first got the hood. Except that i have the whole tank turned around backwards from they way that its supposed to fit. It just looks better that way. Now i want to make a little nano reef out of one of these, just gotta find a way to get sufficent flow threw the tank with out causing a dust storm. Any ideas? Link to comment
hickncali Posted November 21, 2003 Author Share Posted November 21, 2003 skylsdale-- well as of right now im running it with out a heater, just to see what happens. Also the smallest heater being a 50w wont fit in the tank. I already tried. Plus they are very hardy little animals anyways so I just might for go the heater entirely. Still yet to figure out what im going to do Link to comment
z6joker9 Posted November 21, 2003 Share Posted November 21, 2003 they have HOB filters that do <20gph, and 25w submersible heaters. Link to comment
hickncali Posted November 21, 2003 Author Share Posted November 21, 2003 z6joker9-- a HOB filter would be great, but i want to try to keep the clean look of the hood. So im looking for something in the means of a very small, very week power head. Who makes those 25w heaters, i have yet to see them Link to comment
z6joker9 Posted November 22, 2003 Share Posted November 22, 2003 i know we sell a brand or two of 25w at petsmart, and some that are even less but no thermistat. i cannot remember any of the brand names, but i'll have to look it up when i go. marineland has a new line of heaters(or we just started carrying them), and they are relatively small too. i think a 404 powerhead can be cut down to like 20 gph, is there a size smaller? Link to comment
wetworx101 Posted November 22, 2003 Share Posted November 22, 2003 What kind of mantis is it? How big? Keep in mind that IT may not need alot of room, but they produce alot of waste, the reason why many keep them in larger tanks. At the very least you will have to give frequent water changes and have a strong filter...dont forget the iodine! There is a microjet... http://www.aquariumsystems.com funny, I didnt know marineland owned perfeco and aquarium systems...it looks like they are migrating many aquarium systems products into the marineland line. Link to comment
skylsdale Posted November 22, 2003 Share Posted November 22, 2003 And don't forget to not dust, clean your windows, etc. around the tank. You may want to check this out: http://www.blueboard.com/mantis/index.htm Link to comment
hickncali Posted November 22, 2003 Author Share Posted November 22, 2003 wetworx101-- Im not exactly sure of what species of mantis it is. he is about the size if a US quarter. As for frequent water changes, that is something that i already had planed out i was going to do a water swap with my 30 gal tank, take out half a gallon in my mantis tank put it in the 30 and vise versa. That will be done about once a week. As of right now i have a 2.5gal. tank with with an O. clown and do water changes once a week. So that is no big deal to me. As for the microjet, i cant seem to figure out how big it is. I see the gph but no size dementions. I also thought about a maxi-jet and using it externaly and closing off on the flow but that would just creat to much heat. If i could find out how small these mico-jets are, i would seriously think of making myself a small reef out of what i have done so far. skylsdale-- what do ya mean by dusting, im kinda lost. But i have been to that website. I actually read threw alot of that website before i found my mantis shrimp at the lfs. Link to comment
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