Are sally lightfoots supposed to do that?

[cnlight]

I noticed the other day that my green star polyp had some of its polyps missing. The next day, it starting looking like it had a bald spot in the middle. Then I saw why the polyp looked so bad, my sally lightfoot was munching away on the polyps. After that one snack, the crab left the polyp alone, then a week later it did it again.

I've never heard of this, I thought these crabs were reef safe, is there anything I can do to deter it from eating my polyps?:scared:

 

[spline9]

I'm under the impression that all "reef-safe" crabs are actually questionably reef-safe. I've read mixed stories about mithrax crabs so I figure its a hit/miss type situation.
Probably the best thing to do is keep it well fed. That way it wont have the urge to nip at other stuff like your GSPs.

 

[switch]

I also have a sally lightfoot that seems to be on the aggressive side, i have seen him fight for food and lunge at passing fish during feeding time but other then that i havent seen him eating any coral.
i once saw a sally lightfoot about the size of my fist at my local fish store, his red eyes and yellow legs were so bright it was scary, the staff said he was a agro little fella

 

[shawnts106]

The last time I had Sally Lightfoots was about 3 years ago... I had 3 in a 55 gallon, they were great cleanup crew!!... Then I noticed one night while watching TV one of the crabs was at the very top rock in the tank ... shaking like CRAZY! and little white things were comming out and the bangs. were eatting them and the the other fish were eatting them... after this I saw the biggest crab come over and go underneath the other crab and seemed to attach itsself to it... I QUICKLY GRABED MY VID CAM AND TAPED IT!... I believe that these crabs were matting and the female had just released larve!!!... I then discoverd how to tell male and female sallys apart... its very easy.. the males have a larger claw than the other claw they have and are ussually larger overal than the females!!!
This was very exciting.. I just wish I could have Tank Raised the larve!!!

 

[cnlight]

Well, maybe the crab is hungry, but I can't see how, I feed plenty and there is a lot of different types of algae for him to feed on. He does seem to clean all day and is quite aggresive when it comes to finding food.

 

[wrassecal]

I think it most likely the sallylightfoot was eating algae from down in the polyps and inadvertantly did the damage. I've seen mine picking algae from the base of my gsp before. Generally, they just close up for a while after he's given the base area a cleaning.