Cadavers, shells, skeletons, take it or leave it.

basile · Aug 27, 2014

Taking out a shrimp skeleton out of the tank, suddenly realised that many of my cerith snails shells where empty.

Bit annoyed really, i took them out as well, and wondering if others do the same, if its better to leave them there, for any reason at all, or like me i like to know that if its there its alive.....

The same goes for the shrimp skeleton should i leave it there to be food for critters or is it good maintenance to take it out.

In my refugium i like to keep it mostly orderly , but leave the little bits there, just in case disaster, and your main shrub dies or becomes prey to what ever , you still have , small bits to pick up with. Learned that one very quickly and saved me from ordering again.

I should point out that my tank is a no hermith zone, they've clean me out too many times of snails and then kill each other out. So i only have snails, urchins, conch, serpent star, starfish, and other cleaners that don't prey on one another. Emeral crab are the only ones i have. And never seen them attack any of my snails.

So whats your take on this ?

I write big for my iphone friends

TJ's Reef · Aug 27, 2014

I typically remove Shrimp molts but always leave empty Snail shells, either for Hermits or pod/Mysis Shrimp reproduction. I'm willing to guess that your 'Conch' is eating the Ceriths. My 'Tongas' Nassarius Snails have eaten around a 100 or more Ceriths and Nassarius vibex. Actually interesting to watch them hunt down and capture them, then to release an empty shell a few minutes later.

Cheers, Todd

GHill762 · Aug 27, 2014

my mp10 eats my dwarf ceriths :xd:

I leave shells, I may gather them and put them back behind my rocks or whatever but I don't take them out.. I don't have shrimp molts anymore, my old camels jumped out of my last tank and my skunk died just before the upgrade

and I'm too cheap to buy another $30 cleaner shrimp lol...