Interesting Shrimp Hitchhiker

[Sharlow]

A couple of these shrimp ended up hiding away in a shipment to my LFS. I run a pest tank, so I was told to come get them. I'm normally great with I.D.ing inverts, but these guys are so.. strange.

They're about 5 inches long, nocturnal, and not a fan of swimming. They mostly run about on the sand bed, sifting it about looking for food. They haven't bothered any coral, or any of the numerous inverts or pests currently in the tank. We did have one jump out, and now keep the tank covered.

 

[Lovemyreef2015]

It looks like bait shrimp to me.. having more information would help. Like what location did the shipment come from? We had a bait shrimp left over from fishing a long time ago and put it in one of our tanks and would do the same thing. It would crawl across the sand and eventually buried itself in the sand with just its eyes poking out.

 

[Sharlow]

I'm not sure where the shipment came from, but I know these guys were bagged with Ghost shrimp and Skunk Cleaners. We often get Blue crab and rock crabs hitchhiking from that shipper, so I would assume they're from the Gulf. They do look a lot like Shore shrimp that we use for bait, and they do love to hide in the sand until it's lights out.