Nice Of Them To Stop In For Brunch

[adelro28]

These guys are deffinatly eating my polyps.

Is this normal?

What is the best remedy?

 

A

[jmt]

They're scavengers that eat crap off the bottom. I highly doubt they're eating your polyps. They also scatter when the lights come on. That's why I refer to them as the cockraoches of the ocean.

 

-Justin

 

PS - Your fish, if you have them at least, are more than likely eating them as well.

[Whitten]

Ah yes Grammerus shrimp. Will kinda give you a scare if you associate them with a Mantis larvae.

[adelro28]

I have witnesses, they aer eating the polups.

What eats them?

[aggiereefer]

6 line wrasse or a red scooter blenny. Some ppl are anti-red scooter blenny. Alot of ppl get them and they decimate the pod population of the tank within a VERY short time period and they will starve unless you feed. I have one and I feed him frozen brine and mysis.

[adelro28]

In this picture you can see a relatively happy polyp community.

[adelro28]

Nowin this shot, you can see that there are no longer any yellow polyps.

[adelro28]

The new neighbors moved in, where are the yellow polyps?

[jmt]

Those don't exactly look "happy". What were the time spans b/w pics? It would take a shrimp a good while to eat something 4 times its size.

[darwin604]

I'll second JMT, those polyps look anything but happy. The other two could have died / detached. There's no way those pods completely consumed those two polyps.

 

d.

[Paulc]

I have those very same creatures in my tank and they are not eating my yellow polyps. It is possible that the corals are getting too much light. I have mine placed low in the tank away from high intensity light. Happy yellow polyps should be open and showing relatively long tentacles.

 

Hope this helps

[adelro28]

I should make a correction.

Those pics were taken with the lights off so that I could get the "buggs" in the shot, as such the polyps are closed.

On Monday there were 2 yellow polyps and the few off collored ones. The yellow polyps were fully extended and bright when i shut the lights off at 7pm after 12 hours of light.

On Wednsday, after 12 hours of no light the yellow ones were gone.

I have an Eclipse 1 hood with one flourescent, and one actinic bulb. It's a 10gal. tank and the poylps are on the bottom.

[LITTLEFISHEE]

You might want to keep an eye out for box snails, I too find it hard to believe that the grammerus are eating your polyps. Do you have a peppermint shrimp?

[Whitten]

Box snails? What in the heck do those look like? And while we are on the subject of stuff not looking happy, I have a snail that looks like it has a pistachio nut for a shell is he a problem? For some reason my GSP is very pale colored, and I can't figure out why. Maybe I have an issue with forigne critters, but I know that it isn't copopods. If you absolutly hate copo pods get a Mandrin Goby, they will eat all of them in two days.....but then you had better have something else that it will eat or it will starve.

[Whitten]

Tell me Peps aren't a problem?

[adelro28]

The Grammerus shrimp ate a;; of the polyps in less than 10 days.

There are quite a few of the shrimp, so i have no doubt they are the culpret.

[madness]

OK. Have you ACTUALLY seen them eating your polyps? None of this anectodal evidence stuff; I mean jaws (or whatever)munching on polyps? Because, it sounds like the collective knowledge of this board (which you are asking for, right?) is telling you that these shrimp normally don't eat polyps.

 

What fish do you have? What are your parameters and recent changes? I'm betting dollars to donuts that the guys on this board are right.

[milhouse74]

Yeah I learned when too many people on a board like this one agree, don't argue with them, chances are experiance is on their side.

[mattie]

gammurous pods do not eat polyps they are scavengers they may nibble on dead polyps

 

yellow polyps sometimes fall off when they are introduced to a new area and they do not like there placement a trick i have learned to make them stay put is to manually feed them frozen foods when they are open that will make them want to stay where thay are and will increase the speed at which they can multiply

 

i have witneessed peppermint shrimp and emerald crabs not eating the polyps but unmount them taste em and throw em away so check the sand in the back for dark buggar looking things that could be yoour polyps dead or dying

 

hth

[adelro28]

Lights on. The polyps were there, extended and adjusting to the fishless tank.

 

Lights off for 12 hours, then back on again, the spot where the polyps were is covered in those shrimp like pods, they scatter and there is what looks like a pile of debris where the polyps once were.

 

At the time the inhibitants included:

Polyps

3 turbo snails

a few feather dusters

a hand full of those slightly bigger than microscopic round snails.

 

SG= 1.25

Temp = 84

Amonia = 0

Nitrates = 0

Nitrites = 0

This is assuming that the test kits are any good.

I'm not frustrated, i'm just rying to avoid killing anything else.

[cachocachocacho]

i would say its way too hot..... mine stays at 78, and my yellow polyps stay open all day and none have dissapeared.. i

[smaug]

get a hold of a sony cancorder with night shot and watch them in the dark;) if they are you can record it and prove your point. Good luck

Richard

[Keng Yew, Leong]

I wouldnt say its the temp,my previous tank was 86 n my polyps were happy. Have u checked for bristleworms??

[oozthaman]

I found one of those pod shrimps, hitch-hiking with a bag of artemia i bought. funny little things that just seem to wander around but not doing any harm.

If they are scavengers, could the be feasting on the remains of dead polyps?

Have you checked your tank for any othewr hitch hikers that could have come with your live rock?

[MillerLite]

As everyone says, could be another hitchhiker. The temp does seem a bit high for yellow polyps. Also, have you considered a water contaminant. Have you done anything to your water (ie. dosed with anything new) recently? Yellow polyps can be very sensitive to changes in water quality and clarity. Also do a search on yellow polyps. You will find that suddenly without notice, a whole population of established healthy yellow polyps, suddenly start to die off. I had just about a whole rock of yellow polyps mysteriously start to die off. Only 5-6 survived and now they have grown back to 30 or so. NOt sure what I did, but things like this just may happen for reasons unknown. Maybe survival of the fittest and the scavenger crew was there to help clean up the mess of dying or dead polyps. Anyone else have any ideas...