Pom Pom Crab

[reefnut]

Anyone have any experience with these crabs? I seen some in a LFS last Saturday and they looked pretty cool. Just looked them up and it says reef safe... Any thoughts?

 

[moopiespoo]

My friend has a couple of these in her reef. She feeds them pieces of fresh cocktail shrimp and the scavenge the sand for food. The bad thing is you hardly ever see them, they hide alot. Another interesting thing is they never drop the anenomes except when they molt. HTH.

 

[reefnut]

Thanks, has see ever had a problem with corals being stung by the anemones? I was thinking of one in the 6g... that way I could find it more often.

 

[hairtrigger]

Are these the crabs with little anenomes on their main claws?
Main claws... ugh. Sounds so uneducated. Leave me alone. Rough day at work.

 

[jugger]

this is a bad pic of mine...hes never stung any of my coral...i had two but my arrow crab ate the other..... i see mine alot but thats probly cuz i only have a 20g

 

[jonthefb]

we have one of these little guys in our 7g bowfront at work..he is frigin awesome.....its a reef tnak and weve never had problems with him huritng any other corals with his anemones....they are soo cool...i love the way they "shadowbox" by moving their anemones all around!
good luck
jon

 

[reefnut]

HairTrigger, they do carry anenomes on their main claws. Kinda cool I thought .
jugger, nice pic!!
Jon, shadowbox... lol. That could be entertaining!!
I may just have to pick one up .

 

[clarkiiboi]

Another interesting thing is they never drop the anenomes except when they molt.
I had wondered about these too, awhile back, and just thought to myself its probably not a good idea in a reef. I thought I read or seen that it will pick at corals to replace the pom poms if lost or whatever it had available. And, if drops the anenomes when molting, how does it get more? does it pick it off the molt? Use coral pieces? Just a thought to throw in there for ya ReefNut---adding to the confusion. Curious too.

 

[aarone]

I wonder why it carries an anemone?

 

[jonthefb]

the anemone grows out of its pincers...its some kind of crazy modification.....the crab waves the anemones around in the water to catch zoo/phytoplankton whcih it then consumes! like its holding flypaper!
good luck
jon

 

[aarone]

thanks jon!

 

[moopiespoo]

They pick their anenomes back up after their exoskeleton hardens./

 

[hairtrigger]

Reef.... that is really cool. I agree. I was curious about them myslf but forgot about em until now. Good stuff.