Little shrimp in clam?

vetteguy53081 · Jan 24, 2020

DSC is correct- food thief.

BloopFish · Jan 25, 2020

The thread kind of made me curious, so when I shucked a dozen oysters yesterday and found a couple pea crabs/oyster crabs I decided to throw them in a container in the tank to see what would happen. They've been in the tank for almost a day now. I'm assuming they will die after a while.

DSC reef · Jan 25, 2020

I believe their survivability would increase with a host.

BloopFish · Jan 25, 2020

DSC reef said:
I believe their survivability would increase with a host.

Yeah, that I would assume also... but thats not happening - not going to give something a parasite intentionally lol, I'm just curious to see how it behaves outside of a host and what I might manage to make it eat.

DSC reef · Jan 25, 2020

BloopFish said:
Yeah, that I would assume also... but thats not happening - not going to give something a parasite intentionally lol, I'm just curious to see how it behaves outside of a host and what I might manage to make it eat.

Very cool, I'm interested in seeing how long they live too. Keep us updated.

BloopFish · Jan 25, 2020

DSC reef said:
Very cool, I'm interested in seeing how long they live too. Keep us updated.

Yes, will definitely try to. I tried to feed it a chopped seafood blend, but I'm not sure if they ate any of it. Will try again and with perhaps other foods.

BloopFish · Jan 27, 2020

Its been a few days since I added the pea crabs into a plastic container floating in the tank (theoretically they shouldn't care about space since they live in an oyster for their entire life lol). I have yet to visually see a feeding response from them - but they are indeed still alive. They are also VERY bad at walking, they also look very creepy and spider like when they do try to.

jda · Jan 27, 2020

If it is clearish with some spots, then it is a symbiotic shrimp. These used to come in all the time on wild clams, but not so much with smaller AQ ones.

I had a trio of larger (8 ish inches) T. Noae that had pairs in them that you could easily see when they were open.

Blknovass · Jan 27, 2020

That is awesome!

Terri Caton · Jan 27, 2020

When I see these kinds of posts I always think they’re like, “I have a “friend “...lol

Daniel@R2R · Jan 31, 2020

BloopFish said:
Its been a few days since I added the pea crabs into a plastic container floating in the tank (theoretically they shouldn't care about space since they live in an oyster for their entire life lol). I have yet to visually see a feeding response from them - but they are indeed still alive. They are also VERY bad at walking, they also look very creepy and spider like when they do try to.

Haven't seen these guys before.

BloopFish · Jan 31, 2020

Daniel@R2R said:
Haven't seen these guys before.

They're found in oysters, mostly from oysters grown near wild ones and in slightly warmer waters (compared to the very cold waters of some of the east coast). Sometimes you'll even find them in mussels and other bivalves.

Speaking of which, these two died today. It seems like they weren't eating any of the food I was giving it. Since they last so long, I don't think temperature was the main issue, more likely the food source. However, the temperature could have been a component to speed up their death. Since they steal food from their host oyster, I have no clue what you could feed these.