New to reefs, opnions welcome

[Night_Blade]

Hey guys, i am new to the forum and reef community, i recently started a tank a few months ago. It is an aqua medic yasha 70 tank. Relativley small but i thought that would be good to start with. I have a royal gramma and two banggai cardinals, some hermit crabs, fromia seastar, peppermint shrimp and cleaner shrimp and two snails. I originally wanted to post to get you guys' opinion on my tank and what could be improved etc but also would like some advice on a hitchhiker mantis shrimp it came with the live rock and its clicking sounds all day long are driving me kinda nuts. It is small about 5-6 cm long. But i am worried it will start killing and eating my livestock. I'll be adding pics of my tank so you can tell me your opinions. Go all out, it's in the 'ugly' stage at the moment. But for my first reef tank so far so good. For corals i have mostly softies: GSP, kenya tree, toadstool, leathers, sympodium, ricordea and rhodactis, etc and also some montipora and cyphastrea. Sorry for the bad quality pics hopefully you guys have some good advice and tips for me or just your honest opinion. Thanks guys!

 

[RockBox13]

Are you sure it’s a Mantis shrimp, or could it be a pistol shrimp making the popping noise?

 

[Fish Fan]

Welcome to reef2reef!

If it's either a pistol shrimp or a Mantis, both can be trapped with simple DIY traps, often made from empty plastic water bottles. Give it a search, lot's of creative ideas to get these guys.

Good luck!

 

[Night_Blade]

Almost 100 percent sure, i was playing around with the coral placement and saw it swim away from the rock i was touching. It is a constant clicking noise the second i feed the tank, i think i will one day restart the tank and dip the rock in freshwater and see what happens. I have started a second tank for corals only, so i'll temporarily put the livestock in that one when i restart the first tank

 

[Anna K]

Welcome to the community! For your first tank I think it looks fantastic! Can you try and get a photo of the mantis shrimp just for confirmation?

 

[Night_Blade]

Welcome to the community! For your first tank I think it looks fantastic! Can you try and get a photo of the mantis shrimp just for confirmation?

Thank you so much! I have kept freshwater for years, the mantis shrimp is very hard to get on photo, i saw it only once and since then i only hear it. But when i do find it, i'll keep it in an acrylic tank or bring it back to the store

 

[Fish Fan]

Almost 100 percent sure, i was playing around with the coral placement and saw it swim away from the rock i was touching. It is a constant clicking noise the second i feed the tank, i think i will one day restart the tank and dip the rock in freshwater and see what happens. I have started a second tank for corals only, so i'll temporarily put the livestock in that one when i restart the first tank

Don't dip your rock in freshwater, you'd be doing much more harm to the rock than good.

If it's clicking constantly, it's likely to be a pistol shrimp, but Mantids can make a similar sound (the smashers, at least).

Either way, this is not the end of the world. Both can be trapped, as mentioned before. A Mantis can be lured out with a piece of seafood on a bamboo skewer or some tongs. Look into DIY traps with a tumbler glass (whiskey type glass) or empty plastic water bottles.

Example: You cut the top off an empty plastic water bottle, add some bait like a piece of shrimp, invert the cut top back on the bottle, and place near where you think the mantis is. Like this:
https://www.seahorse.org/library/articles/DIY/diyMantisTrap.shtml
Just about any pest can be delt with, there's no reason to go nuclear on the rock over this.

@BryanM Didn't you just deal with catching several Mantids? How did you do it? Thanks for your help!

 

[BryanM]

Example: You cut the top off an empty plastic water bottle, add some bait like a piece of shrimp, invert the cut top back on the bottle, and place near where you think the mantis is. Like this:
seahorse.org - DIY Mantis Trap

I did this. But I've done it several times without success.

What worked this time was poking a ton of holes in the bottle trap....I think this allows the smell of the mysis to attract things.

Of course three snails got in there too.

 

[Fish Fan]

Example: You cut the top off an empty plastic water bottle, add some bait like a piece of shrimp, invert the cut top back on the bottle, and place near where you think the mantis is. Like this:
seahorse.org - DIY Mantis Trap

I did this. But I've done it several times without success.

What worked this time was poking a ton of holes in the bottle trap....I think this allows the smell of the mysis to attract things.

Of course three snails got in there too.

Thanks, BryanM!

That trap I linked was just an example. There’s lots of ways people can catch them. No need to harm the rocks, in my opinion.

 

[BryanM]

Thanks, BryanM!

That trap I linked was just an example. There’s lots of ways people can catch them. No need to harm the rocks, in my opinion.

Totally agree.

This is the 3rd I've caught now... and I'll be god danged if there isn;t a fourth one in the tank.

Can't get another 6-line until I catch all the mantis. I have no proof, but my 6line was doing just fine, and one day poof, gone.

 

[mboley]

I had one in a tank years ago; it came with live rock. I couldnt manage to trap it so I used piece of 3/8" rigid tubing and managed to pin it against a rock and kill it. Not cool I know, but the claw was an inch long. I was nervous about getting sliced.

 

[748S911]

Welcome to R2R great looking reef.

 

[Night_Blade]

Thanks everyone for the replies! I'll see what i can do about the mantis shrimp, for now i'll just leave it as is. It hasn't hurt any of my livestock so it should be fine i think. I was also wondering if anyone had any experience with keeping corals in lower temperature tanks? Like 21 celsius. Just a theoretical question. I am setting up a second coral only tank and was also wondering if could establish a mysis shrimp colony in there?