Do peppermint shrimp eat rfa?

[growsomething]

This is the 2nd time in 3 weeks something has eaten an rfa while the other rfa in the tank are fine.  I saw a peppermint with the end of it's longest feelers feeling this thing over.

It's possible it was just checking it out but it is the only thing I have seen on it.

Has anyone heard of them eating rfa?

 

I had to move it to the new 3g tank.  Here it is all balled up under 

 

[growsomething]

Of course they do!  Theu eat aiptasia 😄

What was I thinking.

[Pjanssen]

Hmmm. I don't think your peppermint shrimp would eat your RFA. They eat tiny baby aiptasia. Just because its curled up into a ball doesn't mean its been eaten, could just be irritated. 

[Jaren45]

I've had a couple peppermint shrimp in every tank I own for aiptasia control, they've never touched my rock flower or mini maxis I had in a couple different tanks.

 

If that tank is as new as it looks, anemones really just don't like new tanks in my experience.

[growsomething]

Two 3 y.o. healthy rfa were already completely eaten over several days a week or so ago, and this one was acting the same way, so I pulled it immediately.  2 huge (4"+), healthy rfa still in the same tank, so it's not water related.  These were the smallest and this one I had just added after the other were eaten to replace them.

Quite a few anecdotes in other forums about rougue peppermints eating different types of anemone.  This is the 3rd time I've had peppermint in this tank for aiptasia coming in on frags or macro, but the 1st time I've had a rougue one.  They did eradicate all aiptasia several months ago.  They will be trapped and returned to the lfs this wknd.

After pulling this rfa and placing in the 3g, I fed it one pellet.  It was already balled up but enveloped it with it's smooth outer skin.  Over 3 hs before bedtime it kept uncovering and covering the pellet.  It either thought it was an irritant or it's body or mouth are too damaged to eat.  Since it's reacting and moving some I have hope for it.

 

Old tank with current healthy rfa's (& algae!)

 

New 3g with the recovering rfa with pellet.

 

 

[Tired]

Depends on the species of peppermint, but a lot of shrimp will steal food from RFAs, and they are known to eat them. 

 

But, yes, the tank might just be too new. RFAs, though hardier than some other anemones, need a reasonably stable, reasonably mature tank.

[Dmmitchell]

I was lucky to have RFA's spawn in my tank. You could see a significant number of 'babies' scattered throughout -- but over time they all disappeared. I hate to do it, but I blame the peppermint shrimp for devouring them. They've never touched the large ones, however.

[growsomething]

I hope to have a spawn, hasn't happened in 3 + ys. 

Maybe I didn't make it clear in the 1st post, all 3 eaten were in the old, very high nutrient tank, and the remaining rfa there are huge.  The last of the 3 balled up ones was moved to a new 3g with majority live rock to try to save it from whatever was eating it.  Its center was too damaged and I haven't seen it in a week.  2 newer rfa you can see in the pic are looking great.

Peppermints were trapped 2 weeks ago and all is well with remaining old rfa.  One peppermint was the largest I have seen and was berried up, very full.  May have needed extra preggo nutrition.