Peppermint Shrimp Euthanize?

[Hoodstream]

Before I share I want to say I am not heartless or inhumane. I have two peppermint shrimp and one was eating a snail, I presume it died, and the other picked off two of my Zoa polyps and munched them. The snail isn’t a deal breaker but I noticed they’re becoming more aggressive eaters. Today one jumped in my torch to steal the brine I fed and my torch shrunk for a hour or two. I’ve called every lfs around me and they will not take them. Probably because when asking why I needed to re-home or If there was a health concern I was truthful, idk. I put them on OfferUp and my Facebook but if nobody reply’s what could be the next steps? I refuse to stomp them as a form of euthanasia, I have more tanks then I can handle all have coral, but did see a thing that said freeze them and feed them to my hermits but again idk I just feel bad. Any suggestions to get them to stop eating polyps or euthanasia? The tank is well fed, Not overstocked, plenty of algae.

 

[MartysReef]

Put them in your sump! If you have a sump they can live there for a while and get used to eating what's in there lol

 

[Joe31415]

It's not just common, but normal and expected for a euphyllia to close up for a while if something touches it. I wouldn't worry about that. Similarly, it's normal for shrimp to grab food from them. My cleaner shrimp is always grabbing food from my frogspawn (which is right next to where the shrimp hangs out). Nothing to worry about. A 'trick' is to spot feed the shrimp to keep it occupied long enough for the coral to get a good grip on the food. Besides, the torch won't have any issue grabbing it's food right out of the water column.

As for it hurting the corals. I can't speak to that. My cleaner picks at them, but that's it and my peppermint is in an invert only QT. So it's just the shrimp, a few snails/crabs and about a dozen corals. But that's mine, yours is going to be different. In any case, that's not why the LFS doesn't want it. Even if your shrimp isn't reef compatible, they have tons of inverts and fish that aren't reef compatible. Besides, there's a pretty good chance it's going to sit in a tank with a bunch of other shrimp and no corals while it's waiting to be sold anyway. My money is on them not wanting it because they have enough already.

 

[Uncle99]

So, it’s either get used to saving your fortune or putting in a long nose hawkish and he will do that for you at no additional charge. You can argue that’s nature.
Managing a system has its bad points.
I hate killing anything and only use when there is little choice.
Be done with them and move forward

 

[CNDReef]

Make a bottle trap and boil them up. It’s on my to do list with my 2 peppermints lol

 

[Tired]

Never boil animals to kill them! It's inhumane, and should frankly be illegal for seafood places to be doing with lobsters. Kill the poor things before you cook them, for goodness' sake. It's just as fresh if you kill it two seconds before it goes in the water.

Freezing is a debated method with invertebrates. It's unclear whether or not it's humane.

Crushing an animal can be a humane euthanasia method, but you have to do it in one swift motion, and crush the head completely in one go. If it doesn't have an intact brain, it can't suffer. Pithing is a similar idea, but not really viable with tiny animals.

Clove oil works on fish and worms. I've never tested it with shrimp, but it should work there as well. You put the critter in a container of water, then shake a small, separate bottle of water with a few drops of clove oil, to mix the oil into the water. Add the clove oil mixture slowly to the container with the critter. When it's unresponsive, double the amount of clove oil and leave it for a few hours, if not overnight.
Clove oil is a sedative, so the animal is gradually sedated into unconsciousness, then dies. The reason you add the oil slowly is so as not to scare it with the weird smell and possible mild irritant. It's humane, effective, and should be in every aquarium keeper's medicine cabinet for when something just isn't going to recover from whatever's wrong. Probably shouldn't feed it to other creatures, but you can just bury it in a flowerpot or outside instead.

But yes, it's normal for corals to close up briefly if bothered, and feeding shrimp in another area of the tank is always an option.

 

[Doctorgori]

I’m witcha…I get a lil irate when my buddies tie fish up on a stringer dangling off the boat in warm water…

IMO they taste as good or better throat cut and tossed in the cooler …

I think cattle should be turned loose and hunted, and I think slaughtering 60 million bison in lieu of meat packing plants was stupid

I kill my critters with a quick slam against concrete, I doubt they suffered long

still world ain’t changing no time soon no matter…rambling on…

 

[Hoodstream]

Respectfully this was awhile ago lol. I found a shop that took them back. Thanks though.

Never boil animals to kill them! It's inhumane, and should frankly be illegal for seafood places to be doing with lobsters. Kill the poor things before you cook them, for goodness' sake. It's just as fresh if you kill it two seconds before it goes in the water.

Freezing is a debated method with invertebrates. It's unclear whether or not it's humane.

Crushing an animal can be a humane euthanasia method, but you have to do it in one swift motion, and crush the head completely in one go. If it doesn't have an intact brain, it can't suffer. Pithing is a similar idea, but not really viable with tiny animals.

Clove oil works on fish and worms. I've never tested it with shrimp, but it should work there as well. You put the critter in a container of water, then shake a small, separate bottle of water with a few drops of clove oil, to mix the oil into the water. Add the clove oil mixture slowly to the container with the critter. When it's unresponsive, double the amount of clove oil and leave it for a few hours, if not overnight.
Clove oil is a sedative, so the animal is gradually sedated into unconsciousness, then dies. The reason you add the oil slowly is so as not to scare it with the weird smell and possible mild irritant. It's humane, effective, and should be in every aquarium keeper's medicine cabinet for when something just isn't going to recover from whatever's wrong. Probably shouldn't feed it to other creatures, but you can just bury it in a flowerpot or outside instead.

But yes, it's normal for corals to close up briefly if bothered, and feeding shrimp in another area of the tank is always an option.

I’m witcha…I get a lil irate when my buddies tie fish up on a stringer dangling off the boat in warm water…

IMO they taste as good or better throat cut and tossed in the cooler …

I think cattle should be turned loose and hunted, and I think slaughtering 60 million bison in lieu of meat packing plants was stupid

I kill my critters with a quick slam against concrete, I doubt they suffered long

still world ain’t changing no time soon no matter…rambling on…

 

[jfoahs04]

Before I share I want to say I am not heartless or inhumane. I have two peppermint shrimp and one was eating a snail, I presume it died, and the other picked off two of my Zoa polyps and munched them. The snail isn’t a deal breaker but I noticed they’re becoming more aggressive eaters. Today one jumped in my torch to steal the brine I fed and my torch shrunk for a hour or two. I’ve called every lfs around me and they will not take them. Probably because when asking why I needed to re-home or If there was a health concern I was truthful, idk. I put them on OfferUp and my Facebook but if nobody reply’s what could be the next steps? I refuse to stomp them as a form of euthanasia, I have more tanks then I can handle all have coral, but did see a thing that said freeze them and feed them to my hermits but again idk I just feel bad. Any suggestions to get them to stop eating polyps or euthanasia? The tank is well fed, Not overstocked, plenty of algae.

I have nothing to add on the euthanasia front. I would just say that it seems a little premature for your situation. As someone else pointed out, shrimp taking food out of a coral's mouth is normal and shouldn't be cause for concern. If you spot feed your shrimp and/or increase feeding frequency, it should temper the aggressive eating. I'm assuming that if you "have more tanks than you can handle," at least one of them has a sump - tossing the shrimp in there would be an easy solution. Finally, I know that in my area, the local reefing club has a forum and there are several local reefing facebook pages. If I posted "free shrimp," it'd be gone before the end of the day. I'd be shocked if there wasn't something similar in Chicago.

 

[Hoodstream]

I have nothing to add on the euthanasia front. I would just say that it seems a little premature for your situation. As someone else pointed out, shrimp taking food out of a coral's mouth is normal and shouldn't be cause for concern. If you spot feed your shrimp and/or increase feeding frequency, it should temper the aggressive eating. I'm assuming that if you "have more tanks than you can handle," at least one of them has a sump - tossing the shrimp in there would be an easy solution. Finally, I know that in my area, the local reefing club has a forum and there are several local reefing facebook pages. If I posted "free shrimp," it'd be gone before the end of the day. I'd be shocked if there wasn't something similar in Chicago.

I got rid of the shrimp the problem is solved this thread is over two weeks old. I took them to a store that would take them. Thank you.

 

[Hoodstream]

Update: I didn’t kill the shrimp. I couldn’t do it, I know to some it’s no big deal but I couldn’t justify killing two shrimps in my conscious. I kept calling places and found one that said to bring them by and did. They took them and that was that. Issue solved. Thanks.