Breeding Decorator Crabs

[Slapp]

Hey folks!

So awhile ago, in September, I got an order of “Micro Decorator Crabs” from reef cleaners.
A dominate male crab killed off two other males, leaving him with two females. Nowadays they consistently spawn every 2 months or so, leaving a group of 50-100 babies just floating around until they get eaten like popcorn.

I was thinking about getting one of those Vossen Larva traps to capture them before they get eaten, but what’s the point?

Larva like these need diverse plankton feedings and those fancy tanks they use for jellies, for what? Who wants to buy a crab that’s not a good cleaner, (although they do eat cyano pretty efficiently), and is not necessarily reef safe.

Would you guys be personally interested? I don’t think I would ship, but before I make a post on my club’s forum I just want to gauge a general want.

The crabs are interesting, and they’re good at cleaning detritus and cyano too. However one absolutely obliterated a Kenya tree coral and still wears it to this day.

Thanks, I’ll add some pictures later.

 

[Green_Lantern]

Too bad you're not closer but I don't blame you for not wanting to ship. I would love to have a few of these little creatures because they fun to watch

 

[ISpeakForTheSeas]

Well, I’d imagine there has to be some demand or the big fish stores wouldn’t offer them for sale. I personally would love a couple of these little guys (particularly if they’re captive bred) if I had a tank up at the moment (but, sadly, I don’t).

That said, if you think you’d be up for it, I’m all for encouraging people to breed whatever they can in their aquarium, document the process, and make the young/breeding info available to the public - the more captive bred specimens available the better, as far as I’m concerned. So, I’d say go for it (if you want)!

 

[DaJMasta]

If you want to try to raise the larvae, do it, and decide where they will go when you have some settled juveniles.

Generally, the planktonic stages of most organisms are very difficult to raise, especially with a species that may not be well described in terms of developmental stages and methods, so if you start your live food cultures and setup a tank with a kreisel or similar sort of low flow larval setup, it will likely be months before you can keep them more than a few days or a week.

The point isn't to dissuade you, it's just to emphasize that worrying about where they go is a LONG way off if you're just starting with them, even if you have some experience raising things before. If you can get them to settle and start acting like adults, then you'll have a lot fewer than the full spawn (often single percent survival rates to a juvenile are good yields and are at least as good as in the wild), and they'll be very small so you'll have some time to find out where they can end up.

I've liked little decorator crabs before, they get a bad rap for moving around corals, but they're interesting little critters. Unless you're producing dozens at a time, you probably won't have trouble finding interested parties provided you will do some limited shipping.

 

[monkeyCmonkeyDo]

I've had the bigger ones before. Never the smaller ones. +1 its kinda like a whole new adventure in its own.
I say try and raise some.
If u get big enough ones to actually call sellers or keepers than I'd start off by taking em to LFS to see if they even sell.
They might not even give u any in store credit 1st off. Will need to see if they are of any value or not...
Hths you I say do it if u have the time.
D

 

[Aleelupton]

Hey folks!

So awhile ago, in September, I got an order of “Micro Decorator Crabs” from reef cleaners.
A dominate male crab killed off two other males, leaving him with two females. Nowadays they consistently spawn every 2 months or so, leaving a group of 50-100 babies just floating around until they get eaten like popcorn.

I was thinking about getting one of those Vossen Larva traps to capture them before they get eaten, but what’s the point?

Larva like these need diverse plankton feedings and those fancy tanks they use for jellies, for what? Who wants to buy a crab that’s not a good cleaner, (although they do eat cyano pretty efficiently), and is not necessarily reef safe.

Would you guys be personally interested? I don’t think I would ship, but before I make a post on my club’s forum I just want to gauge a general want.

The crabs are interesting, and they’re good at cleaning detritus and cyano too. However one absolutely obliterated a Kenya tree coral and still wears it to this day.

Thanks, I’ll add some pictures later.

Did you have any success with breeding your Micro Decorator crabs?