Fire shrimp eating coral?

[FreeEnergyReefer]

Wow! I haven't seen anything remotely close to that in 20years, I've had soo many reefs from a 2.5g to a 220g. Right now they're in a 75g inhabitants include- pair of fire shrimp w/ 1 candycane pistol,pair of yellow watchman gobies, pair of mandarins,pair of clowns, sailfin tang, fairy wrasse,orange linkia starfish,sandsifting starfish,2 blue tuxedo urchins, other cuc. The female fire shrimp stays out in the open 24/7 n has a cleaning station setup. The male's out half the day hides the other half. I spot feed all my lps fauna marin pellets and broadcast homemade & frozen. Theres nothing but high end sps,lps n zoas in this tank and I wouldn't have any other cleaner shrimp in there exept them

 

[Fairies2]

I watched my fire shrimp attack my aussie holy grail torch, he was trying to steal the food even though I already fed him. My tank only has 2 clown fish, 1 diamond goby, him and my torch that he killed! I bought 2 cheap corals later, a hammer and frog spawn but he did the same to them. I should of got rid of him but the damage was already done so now for the last 2 years I've had no corals in my tank.
Just a note my 2 clown fish will not have anything to do with him, I don't know if that's why he attacked my corals and no I don't have any videos but I was awake and saw him and tried to move him off but he kept coming back.

 

[Ahmed Talib]

I think the problem with this shrimp is when your coral gets a little sick, it might recover itself, but shrimp notice it and start eating it flush make it more infected and sick, and then it ends up dying

 

[TeamAquaSD Verified Sponsor]

The shrimp didn't kill it and would not kill a healthy coral. This coral was severely weakened or already dead when the shrimp started to pick at it. Cleaner shrimp are scavengers and, well, cleaners. They are not predatory to corals.

I agree with this post.
99.9% of the time if a invert eats a coral it is generally becuase they are starving to death and that is the only thing that is edible or if a coral is dying already.

 

[James Rutherford]

Not in my case. I have 2 skunk cleaner shrimp and they are eating several perfectly healthy corals in my tank. I believe they are not actually eating the coral but tearing into mouth to get food. They are well fed, so that isn’t an issue.
It maybe due to the fact that they are huge. I’ve had them for a couple of years and they have just developed this lately.
Tearing down the tank tomorrow to get them out.

 

[jewelryking1]

Woke up this morning to find that my fire shrimp had killed and eaten an entire 8 head acan colony!!! At first I thought it was because he was just hungry, but I feed pellets every day and LRS nano frenzy 2-3 times a week and he gets a ton of food each feeding so I don't think that's why. I have had him for about 4 months now and he hasn't bothered anything. I am worried he will start eating other, more expensive corals in my tank as it is made up of around 80% LPS and softies, luckily the acans he got to only cost me 20$ but I have many other acans and LPS in the 50-200$ per head range. Anyone know why this might have happened or how to stop it from happening again? I would also like to add that nothing else in my tank could've done this, it is 10 gallons and has a clownfish, small Midas blenny, and a small reef safe brittle star. My parameters are perfectly normal and nothing else in my tank seems stressed. Any input on this will be greatly appreciated.

Unfortunayely shrimp in general are opportunistically predatious. What clever trick they have is to 'bother' the coral to get it to regurgitate and food it might have in it. This becomes habitual but fortunately to one coral at a time and usually at night. The coral becomes exhausted and expires. I had a hammer die from this ttpe of predacious behavior. Later after the shrimp was removed baby hammers bllomed all over the dead head(13) and is doing extremely well. This is more a learned behavior from a genetic memory base. Hope it helps. Not all shrimp do this from any species.. ahhh but once they do. Take care.

 

[Tahoe61]

Unfortunayely shrimp in general are opportunistically predatious. What clever trick they have is to 'bother' the coral to get it to regurgitate and food it might have in it. This becomes habitual but fortunately to one coral at a time and usually at night. The coral becomes exhausted and expires. I had a hammer die from this ttpe of predacious behavior. Later after the shrimp was removed baby hammers bllomed all over the dead head(13) and is doing extremely well. This is more a learned behavior from a genetic memory base. Hope it helps. Not all shrimp do this from any species.. ahhh but once they do. Take care.

Wow that's interesting. I do believe it can be a learned behavior. Opptunistic feeding is another plausible explanation, the food resource is limited so some inverts resort to corals they wouldn't normally eat.