hairy crab.. grrrr

Willow · #1 02-26-2005, 06:00 AM

ok so i think i had 3 of these monsters in my tank that came in on my jakarta. a few days ago one of the smaller ones ended up in the sandbed in the morning dead. i belive it was the big bastage nailed him in the night. tonite i saw him sitting under my only frag trying to flip it over! i tryed to grab him with some tongs but ended up breaking off a good chunk of his claw. will he die or grow something bigger and badder and beat me with it?

edit.. yeah yeah i can't spell.

G1GY · #2 02-26-2005, 06:33 AM

He'll grow it back.
Use a flashlight late at night and you'll get him without too much trouble.

Don't bother trying to pull him out, those crabs are very soft and you usualy end up just getting a limb anyways. Squash it is your best bet.(Unless you want it for a sump or refugeium.)

Is it's name Harry?

(Or is it Hairy?)

Willow · #3 02-26-2005, 06:46 AM

damn where were you an hour ago! im sitting there with a blue flashlight between my teeth and my arm in the tank with the tongs, crap i knew i should have crushed the little bastage. i dunno why im so wigged by these things it looks so damn freaky.

hockey nut · #4 02-26-2005, 07:17 AM

Just caught my first Harry the other night. I used soda water and he bolted out of his hole in the rock and into the bucket.

Hope you catch him!

BCWolfen · #5 02-26-2005, 09:53 AM

I have a hairy white guy right now thats been crawling around my tank. I usually do a flashlight walk around midnight to see whats going on.
All I ever see him doing is eating algae. Haven't seen any of my softies damaged or missing snails (of course this may change)
But as I've read on wet web media regarding unidentified crabs...."innocent until proven guilty"
I do plan to try and capture him and move him to my fuge once I get my sump...in the next few weeks.
But until then...I will stay the squishy hammer unless he munches something he shouldn't

Willow · #6 02-26-2005, 02:50 PM

im sure he wasn’t going to eat the leather frag but he was trying to flip the plug over so he could get at what was under it. there is no democracy in my tank, if i catch him he’s outa there dead or alive!

SeaHorse_Fanatic · #7 02-26-2005, 04:09 PM

I had a little hitchhiker in my 33g for a long time & it didn't seem to be doing any harm as long as it stayed on the bottom. One day I see him climb to the top of my LR structure & snip, snip, over the next week I lost my pulsing xenia colony that I had been nurturing from about 6 different frags

Never did get the bugger but haven't seen him in about 8 months now.

Personally, I go along with the innocent until proven guilty, but if I suspect a crab is doing damage, he goes in to my 20g Mantis tank

for final judgement

Anthony

BCOrchidGuy · #8 02-27-2005, 05:41 AM

If you know which rock he's hiding under just elevate that rock in a seperate tank (put it on a plastic plant pot that's upside down) when he comes out at night he can't go back in.

Note.. this doesn't work if you've got other rocks for him to make home.

Doug

G1GY · #9 02-27-2005, 06:26 AM

I found the biggest fugly crab yet in my tank tonight!!!

It's black(Kind of looks a bit like a black scorpion colour.) with longer than usual legs, large pointy claws and when it's threatened it starts making a loud clicking (snapping) sound! (About half the volume of my large pistol shrimp.)

I tried catching it and only got one leg after moving about 40 lbs of rock around in the dark.

I have yet to see a crab that makes me squeemish, but this one does!

I'll try again in a couple of hours.

I'm shocked by this one. It's a little un-nerving.

Aquattro · #10 02-27-2005, 06:43 AM

I've seen a couple of crabs in the rock I just bought. I added some mysis for them to eat.