Inactive Hermits

[brycewood]

I picked up some scarlet legged hermits from the LFS last Friday. They seems very active in the invert tank there and pretty active during the acclimation, but in my tank they barely move. One's move less than an inch in a day, just turned around. This seems to indicate a bad sign, any ideas?

 

[bigarn]

What's the temp and SG of your tank?

 

[brycewood]

79.5 and 1.024-1.025

 

[bigarn]

Hmmm :thinking: Do you add iodine or has the tank ever been treated with anything that contains copper? If not, I'd say give them more time to come around.

 

[ophiura]

Do you have other inverts in the tank and do they act normally?

 

[brycewood]

Never added coppper, never added iodine.
Tank contains four snails now, all relatively active.
A camel shrimp, that hides all day and seems to come out at night as there is less aiptasia every morning since he's been there.
So I'll just keep an eye on the levels, and give them time for now I guess...

 

[fedukeford]

i bought a scarlet hermit like a month ago and it always moves VERY slowly

 

[jerthunter]

I am glad I read this post, I had thought adding Iodine was supposed to be good for my inverts. I guess I will stop adding it now in my tank, but out of curiousity would adding Iodine actually cause snails or hermits to be inactive?

 

[ophiura]

Originally Posted by Jerthunter
I am glad I read this post, I had thought adding Iodine was supposed to be good for my inverts. I guess I will stop adding it now in my tank, but out of curiousity would adding Iodine actually cause snails or hermits to be inactive?

The problem is that you shouldn't add it without TESTING for it. If you are doing frequent water changes, and feeding most commercial types of food, you are probably getting iodine in there. Not that people don't monitor and add more, but that you should pay attention to the levels.
Iodine is used by many of these types of animals for proper molting.
I would say that in cases like this, where the animals are new and inactive, I would point to significant changes between the specific gravity at the store and in the current tank (acclimation issues) or heavy metal toxicity.

 

[murph]

You didn't happen to place them right where you wanted them to clean up. My Hermits wont move much until they run out of a food source in that particular area.

 

[brycewood]

Well when I got home today one move quite a bit.
As far as the acclimation idea, i did a three hour drip acclimation. I know for a fact my LFS uses tap water, I only use ro. We both use the same type of salt, oceanic.
It sounds like it's partially an adjustment, partially the nature of them and partially an abundance of localized food.
Thanks,
B

 

[mudplayerx]

Cleaner hermit crabs are VERY active and social critters. However, like all of the saltwater creatures you bring home, they tend to be shy the first day or so. If they remain inactive more than 48 hour, then I would become concerned.
What is your:
ph
alkalinity
nitrate
Does your temperature stay relatively stable? It doesn't fluctuate more than 2 degrees in a 24 hour period does it?
ps- I do not know if most cleaner hermits sold are wild-caught or raised in captivity, but I DO know that I brought some wild ones home from the Gulf Shores. They were completely inactive after a day in my main tank. I attribute it to higher temperature water than they were accustomed to.