horseshoe crab

kilted reefer

kilted reefer

Member
I have one and I rarely see it. It usually comes out to knock over my yellow gorgonian and then dissapear for a week or so.
 
salt nate

salt nate

Member
i havent seen mine in 2 weeks, since I moved my live rock and reef around. I might have frieken stacked rock on him, because I have scraped all the sand around and cannot find him! If I did smoosh him, will it negatively effect my tank if it is left in there? should I take everything out and try and find him?
yeah, dont get a horseshoe! you will never see em!
 
natclanwy

natclanwy

Active Member
They are reef safe but a poor choice for an aquarium since they grow too large for most tanks and they require a large open sandbed in order feed them. Plus they eat all of the benificial creatures that inhabit the sandbed.
 
aquaknight

aquaknight

Active Member

Originally Posted by justinwwwallin
http:///forum/post/2760320
im pretty sure the ones they sell on SWF.com dont get that big
Of the phylum Arthropods, there are 4 classes underneath, Insecta, Arachnida, Crustacea, and Merostomata. I'm pretty pretty sure you know Insecta (insects), which there are over a 1,000,000 species. Arachnida (arachnids, spiders, scorpions,) with 70,000 speices, Crustacea (Crusteans, lobsters, crabs, shrimp) with 26,000 species. Then there's Merostomata, care to guess how many are in there? 4, yes, that's correct, 4. All various type of horseshoe crabs. Their closest relatives died over 544 millions ago. Of those 4 horseshoes, there is 1 Atlantic speices (Limulus polyphemus ), and 3 Indo-Pacific speices, Tachypleus gigas, Tachypleus tridentatus, and Carcinoscorpius rotundicauda. All 4, are very, very close, in terms, of size, behavior, and diet.
I did all that to illistrate a point, it's just really bothersome when people blindly assume something. Like every other week or two weeks, someone will ask to point them to some "dwarf" or mini version of a tang.

Plus it's really neat to know how truly unique Horseshoe's really are.
 
natclanwy

natclanwy

Active Member
I would have to argue that there are very few people on this board have a tank large enough to house any of these Horseshoe crabs for long term.
Tachypleus gigas 2ft
Limulus polyphemus 2ft
Tachypleus tridentatus 2ft
Carcinoscorpius rotundicauda 16" plus tail
If anyone knows of species smaller than what is listed here let me know, I have done a fair amount of research on horseshoe crabs but I am no means an expert. Just a hobbiest that found them very interesting but better left to the ocean.
 
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