Please ID found it in new live rock

[Sycoticrealm]

Found this Lobster I'm guessing in my live rock i smashed up because it had aiptasia on it and i only wanted the star polyps and coralline off of it.
Should i flush it keep it?

 

[ludnix]

It looks like a pistol shrimp, I would look them up and decide if you want to keep it. Some consider them pests while others make tanks dedicated to them.

 

[MTBake]

Looks Like a pistol shrimp to me as well. I like them but some people don't.

 

[Sycoticrealm]

I though they was red it does have one big claw. Thanks i hate to just kill it.
It only about 1cm long.

 

[Sycoticrealm]

The Banded Pistol Shrimp. Thanks for pointing me in the right direction.

 

[ccerone]

I have had a banded pistol shrimp in my reef for 2 years. Hangs with a blenny. Swims around a night. Never bothers anything. I paid $20 for it.

 

[don_chuwish]

Had one for years in a LR crevice - hardly ever got a glance of him. Harmless and fun.

 

[Sycoticrealm]

It a baby now maybe i should just toss it in. Would my cleaner shrimp eat it lol?

 

[MTBake]

I'd toss it in if I were in your shoes.

I've never seen a cleaner shrimp go after a pistol shrimp before. That said, the pistol shrimp looks small enough to hide from a cleaner shrimp.

 

[Capitol Reef Corals]

I used to have this pistol shrimp and a yellow watchman goby pair, theyre harmless and fun to watch. Definitely a good addition i think.

 

[Rakie]

Yep, he will pal around with a small goby species. They're cool critters, totally harmless. In the wild when they get big enough they will eat shrimp -- but in a tank they've got enough food that they don't really 'hunt', they just eat whatever is around. There are some people who've been unlucky and gotten ones that are like 90% evil. Stories of them killing their pet goby, etc etc. Those are probably true, but not too common.

If you don't have a small goby for him, pick up something like a Yasha, or Tangaroa goby. I tend to like the little 2" gobies rather than bigger ones.