Hermit crabs and zoas

[Sharkbait19]

Okay, this is getting annoying.
First I had one zoanthid frag. Every time I clean my tank, my hermit crabs quickly flip over the plug, almost in defiance to the placement. Today, I purchased a colony of toxic green palys and red zoas. Needless to say, the hermit crabs are all over the new rock picking at the zoas. None of my other corals, just the zoas. Why are they doing this?? How do I stop this? I would like to see them opened up, after all, but they’re always stressed out!!!

 

[mindme]

In general, crabs are jerks. I still love them and have about 20 hermits, but they are jerks. I also never put plugs in my DT anymore and just glue them straight to the rock, so that helps.

And they will pick at dead stuff, I've never had them actually eat a zoa. So it being a new rock, they are just going to clean around them for awhile. But yeah, they do lawnmower stuff.

It's just crabs being crabs.

 

[Sharkbait19]

Good to know. That’s kind of what I figured. I’ve noticed the new live rock being much cleaner than before. I guess it’s a trade off— less algae, but less coral extension.

 

[Cole.mormon]

Rid the crabs for extension. Keep for no extension and clean rock. Or get rid pf the crabs and get ceriths snails

 

[muggle reefer]

I have green zoas, the crabs don't harm them. We have red leg crabs. When I add a coral If i don't glue the frag in I look for a place to wedge it into. I have 4 types of soft coral in the tank and the crabs don't harm any of them. We have a leather and one of the emerald crabs climbed up it and kind of hung out there for a while. So we flicked him off after wathing him for a while. Did not do any harm though.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Time to putty them down
I use hold fast putty

 

[Uncle99]

Remove the crabs.
They have zero value, and will slowly eat all they can catch.

 

[Reefman71]

Crabs are bad news when it comes to Zoanthids. Emerald crabs feast on them

 

[pseudorand]

@footgal is this true? Are hermits and zoas incompatible?

Here is my hermit eating a zoa but, it wasn't doing well, a figured the crab was just CUC being CUC.

 

[PicassoClown04]

@footgal is this true? Are hermits and zoas incompatible?

Here is my hermit eating a zoa but, it wasn't doing well, a figured the crab was just CUC being CUC.

Lol no, hermits are fine with zoas. It’s normal for hermits to pick between the zoa polyps for the first couple hours/days just to clean some algae and detritus from the frag. Personally, I dislike crabs just cause of their habit of flipping things over but they won’t harm zoas unless we’re talking the giant hermits. Electric blue leg and scarlet won’t hurt anything

 

[1guydude]

Hes just cleanin your new stuff. Sally light foots are the most aggressive crab u can get imo. The rest are cuc. Arrows can be a little a hole too i hear.
D

 

[PicassoClown04]

Hes just cleanin your new stuff. Sally light foots are the most aggressive crab u can get imo. The rest are cuc. Arrows can be a little a hole too i hear.
D

Arrows are straight up murderers, fun fuge monsters tho! Sally lightfoots are intertidal species, so they will likely attempt to escape the tank and end up dead somewhere in your house

 

[1guydude]

Fun to watch two or three sally lightfoots sweep their legs at fish as they pass by. Lol
D

 

[Reefman71]

True story

 

[Sharkbait19]

Since the beginning of this thread, the hermits have calmed down with corals. They no longer really touch them (besides sometimes falling off the rock onto one). I think maybe they were cleaning the pods and algae off the plug. It was still funny how they’d carry it across the tank like some sort of idol! Now it seems the favia is their new frag for worship...

 

[aquivers]

Yeah I just got zoa frag today & immediately one of the hermits started to eat away but when I watched he was only eating on the algae & not the actual zoa but still stressed my zoa out

 

[Sharkbait19]

To

Yeah I just got zoa frag today & immediately one of the hermits started to eat away but when I watched he was only eating on the algae & not the actual zoa but still stressed my zoa out

Totally normal, nothing to worry about!

 

[aquivers]

Yeah since then they’ve left them alone & the zoas have open up & look to be setting in

 

[SlugSnorter]

Okay, this is getting annoying.
First I had one zoanthid frag. Every time I clean my tank, my hermit crabs quickly flip over the plug, almost in defiance to the placement. Today, I purchased a colony of toxic green palys and red zoas. Needless to say, the hermit crabs are all over the new rock picking at the zoas. None of my other corals, just the zoas. Why are they doing this?? How do I stop this? I would like to see them opened up, after all, but they’re always stressed out!!!

winner winner crab dinner...