Problems with cleaner shrimp

G

greatwit

I have seen my skunk cleaner shrimp on two occasions eating away at my green ricordia polyps to the point of only a nub is left. I have also heard of them bothering some types of lps. In addition I have seen them eating the slime coat off of my green slimer.

Has anyone else had similar problems with a pair of skunk cleaners? I am about to remove them from my tank before they go after my orange or blue rics. I feed the tank daily with either flake or frozen formula 2 and the cleaner shrimp always end up with some.

Tank is an Oceanic 58, with mostly sps.
 
I never heard of that, but that doesnt mean it doesn happen. I just kept mine well fed and it doesnt cause problems. Only time it caused any sort of ruckus was when I fed my corals, and it grabs the food out of the corals mouth. I usually just shoo him away.

He passed in a heater incident, he didnt' live through the tank's summertime (95 degrees)

I would get another one, but I am waiting on a good deal on them, I've seen them for $30
 
Yes, they are most definitely skunk cleaner shrimp. I have have had them for about 6 months and noticed this problem about 2 months ago, before I moved my tank from Austin. Before that I never witnessed any negative habits.

Both of the ricordia they have demolished were slightly bleached from being flipped over in the sand for awhile, but both were recovering nicely. The polyps were not necrotic either. I will probably end up selling the pair, or taking them to a lfs for credit.

Sorry for the small pic, it was all I could access while at work.
 
I have never heard of this nor have seen this behavior from my skunk cleaner. I have only had the cleaner for about 4 or 5 months so I will keep an eye on him. I also have peppermint shrimp and a coral band shrimp and have never observed this behavior from either of these. Like Johnny said, they do steal food out of the LPS corals when I feed them and just shoo them away.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top