Any info on these

[fretfreak13]

Hola,

 

Been searching around for some nifty little dudes to stick in my 6.2 gallon reef. This is mainly an invert tank, but may wind up having one fish to satisfy my room mate. I've found a couple inverts that I've never even heard of. Anyone have personal experience with the Saron shrimp or Staghorn hermit? Decorator spider crabs (Camposcia retusa)? I found these on aquacon.com and they say they are reef safe. Look cool, so I wanted to be sure. What do you guys think or know about them?

[HVani]

Saron shrimp are not reef safe, staghorn hermits get pretty large and are difficult to care for. Decorator crabs are neat but may rip apart corals to "decorate" themselves with.

 

What about a pompom crab? They are really neat

 

Halloween hermits, spiny star astraea, anemone shrimp, sexy shrimp are all ones to look into. Bumble bee shrimp are neat but make sure you can feed them.

 

Also never trust aquacon. They are not a good place at all

[fretfreak13]

Oh, I know about all of those little critters already haha I was just asking about some that I'd never seen before.

 

And thanks for the advice <3

[HVani]

How about a yellow sea cucumber? They are small and pretty neat.

[DaJMasta]

Strawberry crab, limpets, chitons, serpent stars, scallops, anemone shrimp/crabs, pocillopora crabs, squat lobsters, etc. There are quite a few unusual ones, but to get a lot more you'd need a bigger tank.

 

Since we don't really know what you already know about, it's sort of a shot in the dark to find something you haven't heard of. There are tons of cool inverts and even the normal ones can be really interesting (and totally foreign) or have really strange behaviors. Thanks to having inverts in my tank, I've seen a limpet and a sea cucumber spawn, an anemone dig into the sand and climb all over things, a serpent starfish run and climb a tree, I've watched a hermit, emerald, sea star, and other creatures climb on each other to get food, I've watched hermits and snails discover that anemone tentacles sting/stick and be frightened off... there's a lot of unusual activity to see even with the most common of inverts. I mean, have you ever seen a shrimp clean its antennae? Can you imagine how coordinated you would need to be to keep track of that many legs and claws and still get something useful done? How about how you would react if you had no eyes but can detect light with your arms?

 

The point is that 'regular' inverts may be just what you're looking for.

[fretfreak13]

Hravanii: I've always been very cautious with sea cucumbers. Every one I've ever had in larger tanks has died on me from what seemed to be starvation. Maybe I'm just unlucky, but in a 6 gallon tank I think I'll stay away from the heartbreak.

 

DajMasta: Haha don't get me wrong, I love them all! I had a cleaner shrimp in my last tank that swam around like a fish more than walked. He was always upside down on the top of the water "walking" on it, it seemed (his name was Jesus, but the Hispanic pronunciation). Any time I put my hand in the tank he'd instantly hop on and clean under my nails. My friends wondered how my hands were so smooth, so when I brought them over to try it they chickened out thinking it would hurt (and because he kind of looked like a spider lol). I also had a very territorial pom pom crab named Hayhay. Anytime any fish/invert got anywhere close to him he'd wave his little nems around like "ya wanna fight about it?!". I named him that because it reminded me of the crabs in nemo that were all like "Hey...heeeeey!!!!" when they protected their bubbles lol.

 

Currently this is my invert stock wish-list:

-1 Maxima clam

-4 Sexy shrimp

-2 pom pom crabs

-1 porcelain crab

-1 pedersons cleaner shrimp

-1 Halloween hermit crab

-1 Zebra hermit crab

-1 electric blue hermit crab

-a few narci snails for the sand

-POSSIBLY one blood shrimp as a "showpiece". I've seen some pretty big ones, I wanna make sure the fella has room in the tank for those long antennae!

 

Never seen a strawberry crab, have any info on those?

 

I wish I had a big enough tank for a slipper lobster lol We have them at the aquarium where I work and I get to play with them all the time. Very sweet little guys. <3