4 Gallon CAD Light Aquarium

oh I really like that too!

Finally got a good pic of my little sailfin blenny I got the other day. My husband has dubbed him "Tonto" :P



And today I was finally able to find a pair of anemone shrimp after a year of searching! Picked them up from my LFS and have added them to the tank tonight. Fingers crossed they survive! Here's a shot of one of them. The other shrimp took off and is currently hiding under a rock.

cool little shrimpy

Those are really pretty!

great color on the lawnmower and congrats on the shrimp!! fingers crossed!!!

You all can uncross your fingers now. My mini-maxi I added to the tank for the shrimp to host - ate half the shrimp. No joke.

Quick background story: I ended up trading one of the nem shrimps with another reefer. The two weren't getting along in my tank, probably too small of a space to keep them both. Last weekend I got a mini-maxi nem from one of my reefer friends so my remaining anemone shrimp could host it. You know, that whole "symbiotic relationship" thing.

Then this morning, I see half the shrimp sticking out of the mouth of the mini maxi. O_o I looked into it some more, and found some pretty interesting information.

Apparently, most anemone shrimp are parasitic with its host when in a closed system. So while the shrimp benefits by eating tentacles off its host, it's to the detriment of the anemone. Since a lot of host anemones are typically larger and hardier (RBTA's and the like), they can take the damage. Mini maxis, however, have a harder, more stressful time with it.

I had noticed that the first day I put the mini maxi in my tank, the anemone shrimp appeared to be ripping the outer rim of tentacles off and eating them. At first I freaked out, but the anemone seemed to be okay. However, I wanted to keep an eye on it to make sure it wasn't stressed too much, since it was not only introduced to a new tank with different lighting, but was almost immediately getting attacked, too, in the same day. And did I mention it was in the process of splitting when I got it? Yeah, that too.

It "shrunk up" over the next few days, but not to the point where it looked dead. Just a bit stressed. The colors were still fine, and it wasn't trying to turn itself inside out through its mouth, so I wasn't concerned. The shrimp never left the anemone the whole time. So this morning, when I turned the lights on to see the shrimp wasn't on the anemone, but the anemone had something coming out of its mouth, I thought it was the anemone dying, not digesting. When I couldn't find the shrimp in the rest of the tank, though, I put two and two together. When the nem finally spit out what it couldn't digest, I saw the spotted tail of the shrimp

I read a few cases of people losing fish in their tanks to mini maxi carpet anemones, too. One person lost a mandarin to theirs O_o Just goes to show you you never TRULY know absolutely everything about your tank critters. Just sucks to learn about it this way

So, in memory of the shrimp, here are the latest two pics I had taken of it last week.





Here's a pic of the mini-maxi when I first added it. It looks much smaller now because it is still recouperating from being a snack:



Once the nem recovers, and the smaller nem that came from it gets a little bigger and fatter, I will upload more pics.

lol, ohhh noes!!

almost sounds like the shrimp got what he deserves.... In a weird sort of way.

kinda sick and cool at the same time. Poor shrimp. Sweet nem!

That's crazy

I didn't know they were parasitic! Sorry they didn't play well together.

Originally Posted by estanoche

lol, ohhh noes!!

almost sounds like the shrimp got what he deserves.... In a weird sort of way.

Oh yes, I agree. Darn shrimp shouldn't have nommed the outer ring of tentacles off the maxi.

Originally Posted by spinycheek

I didn't know they were parasitic! Sorry they didn't play well together.

I had no idea they were, either! If I HAD known, I wouldn't have actively looked for a mini-maxi for the shrimp, and would have let it continue to host the paly colony it was hosting with no irritation to the colony >.< Live and learn.

Bummer. Sorry about that.

I had a huge carpet Nem that ate a Clown overnight and then ( eewww) spit it back out partially digested. I am sorry that you had a kill.

Originally Posted by Lowtechgal

Bummer. Sorry about that.

I had a huge carpet Nem that ate a Clown overnight and then ( eewww) spit it back out partially digested. I am sorry that you had a kill.

Yuuuuuuuck!! That sounds like it was...quite a site O_o

It's alright. The shrimp was kind of a bully, anyway. And the mini maxi is opening up more now that the shrimp isn't, you know, eating it At least it was a somewhat inexpensive lesson to learn this time!