Finally back!

[Dani305]

I like this tank! I don’t even know what Orion is? Km going to google to see but looking for pics or videos.

 

[TheShrimpNibbler]

Where do you get coquinas from? Do you catch them yourself? I’ve always thought it would be cool to keep some of them in my tack even though I’m sure I’d never see them. Anyways, your tank is very nice looking and I’d love to see some more pictures of Orion.

 

[nmotz]

I like this tank! I don’t even know what Orion is? Km going to google to see but looking for pics or videos.

Thanks! Haha, Orion is just the name I gave to my Peacock mantis shrimp.

 

[nmotz]

Where do you get coquinas from? Do you catch them yourself? I’ve always thought it would be cool to keep some of them in my tack even though I’m sure I’d never see them. Anyways, your tank is very nice looking and I’d love to see some more pictures of Orion.

Yeah I collect them myself. They wash up along the shore and I walk around in the surf and pluck them out of the sand before they can burrow down. I normally only put 2-3 in the tank at once because they have a low survival rate. Most filter feeding clams don't live very long in a home aquarium especially a small tank like mine. I freeze some of them and offer them to Orion later and he loves finding them in the tank.

 

[nmotz]

Here are some pictures and video I took earlier this evening…some strange milky white blemish on my Golden Leptoseris, otherwise corals look ok. Love the Dragon’s Breath macro. It colored up nicely over the last couple weeks. The red Botryocladia has begun popping up all over the tank. Same with the Gracillaria.

 

[nmotz]

double post…

 

[nmotz]

Sorry, here’s a video of Orion on YouTube....the rest seem to be having trouble loading:

 

[nmotz]

Another video:

 

[TheShrimpNibbler]

Another video:

This is really cool!

 

[OneInchPunch]

The tank is looking great, just caught up on the thread and its a good read, nice to see Orion going to town on that crab!

 

[nmotz]

Orion just completed another molt! Been just over 3 months since his last. He’s got a little baby smasher growing back after losing it in the last molt. Will take another few molts before it works normally again. All else looks ok as far as I can tell. I should see him out again in 3-4 days.

 

[nmotz]

Here’s a picture of the raptorial appendage being replaced (your right/his left side). After a couple more molts it will be full-size again.

 

[nmotz]

Some recent photos… Orion still needs to molt a few times before that little smasher grows back fully. Botryocladia went sexual, lol, little sprouts of it are all over the tank. For that reason I removed the bigger parent section of it. At one point the water was becoming nutrient starved and all the macroalgae was dying off. A planted tank will control nutrients. The trick is maintaining the right volume of plant life. Otherwise mostly good news. Corals still ain’t doing much but this is hardly a reef tank anyway.

 

[nmotz]

Another emerald smashin’ video!!! https://m.youtube.com/shorts/pqspSw75DwA

 

[Green_Lantern]

Love the tank! I really want to do a setup like this. What you say has been the biggest challenge in keeping a mantis?

 

[nmotz]

Love the tank! I really want to do a setup like this. What you say has been the biggest challenge in keeping a mantis?

Thanks! Since I only have a 20 gallon tank, I’d say keeping nitrates down was the hardest thing, but once the macroalgae grew throughout the tank it has proven to be less of a problem. At this point I could probably throw a cheeseburger in there and still have low nitrates. Keeping a Peacock mantis is easy if you have a good nutrient export strategy. Now growing coral on the other hand…. that still frustrates me!

 

[nmotz]

UPDATE: some regrets on the decision to use a 20 gallon tank. For those who may be wondering how much the size of a tank really matters to things like chemistry, maintenance, etc: it means A LOT! I do think there's a tipping point where having a tank too big can also be a headache, but it really is more work trying to keep a small tank going especially with hard corals. For me, the only corals to thrive have been a green Montipora hispida, Golden Leptoseris (after a lot of initial problems), and my purple Gorgonian. Every other coral I've tried has been a dismal failure even blue clove polyps, widely considered a weed coral.

Obviously, my own actions are to blame for the coral problems I'm having, but I'm just saying tank volume is a big deal with overall tank stability, and tank stability makes literally everything else easier.

But the good news is that Orion is doing great! Been with me 9 months now. He does make it a bit of a challenge to keep the tank clean. He immediately destroys anything I put in the tank to deal with algae problems. As I wrote about previously, my red gracillaria went sexual early on and my tank is full of it now. I sometimes put emerald crabs in there to deal with it and he kills all of them as soon as he can. It's amazing how much he can eat. He annihilates every species of snail and hermit crab I've tried too. He killed a HUGE conch that was doing a great job cleaning the sand before he found it. He is very active and alert if he smells any other living creature in the water with him. He will dig and tear the tank apart to find every last hermit. Ha, mantis shrimp problems!

 

[nmotz]

 

[nmotz]

My guy just went 5 months without a molt and I thought for sure something was wrong, but 4 days ago I saw him in his pipe munching on his old shell! He's not hardened up enough to hunt outside the burrow yet, but I see him often at the burrow entrance. The smasher he lost a couple molts ago is about 2/3 normal size and will probably be functional again after the next molt.

Need to take a video. The tank looks pretty good actually. A mixture of red gracillaria and red grape macro and no nuisance algae problems at the moment. Corals have only grown a little but coloration is decent, especially with the golden leptoseris, a very hard coral.

Here's an older video of him smashing a crab: https://youtube.com/shorts/xznH3_JcI0M?feature=share

 

[Unknownpharoah1]

This is a great thread for those of us giving the peacock game a try. Love it so far.