Purple Losbter eating my fish!?

[67RedDonzi]

Ok so we have had quite a few fish just disappear lately. Either that or we find them dead with their tail and back half missing.

Today we found our green corris wrasse has huge marks all over him and a large chunk out of his side(not sure if he'll make it)

Our tank consists of: 1 cleaner shrimp, fox face, yellow tag, hippo tang, occallaris clown, starry blenny, bi-color blenny, clown tang, hawkfish, sailfin tang, coral beauty angel, corris wrasse who probably wont be with us much longer, and this purple lobster.

All I can possibly think is that the lobster is eating the fish. The most recent to go were newly added green madarin, snowflake clown, and dwarf lion. The lion and the clown were half eaten and the mandarin looked a bit beat up. Before that our last mandarin just up and disappeared a week ago.

The lobster is about 5 inches long. Has anyone dealt with this problem before?

 

[Shep]

Not surprised, they are opportunistic/scavenger feeders and if they are not getting enough food they will go after what they can.

 

[Small triggers]

Most likely the lobster... They tend to grab smaller/slower fish or wrasses that burrow...

 

[67RedDonzi]

well shoot....now the question is how to catch him before he eats anyone else!! We feed our tank misis and krill frozen cubes every night, along with pellets during the day. The lobster seemed to do very well with this for a good 3-4 months I believe

 

[Shep]

well shoot....now the question is how to catch him before he eats anyone else!! We feed our tank misis and krill frozen cubes every night, along with pellets during the day. The lobster seemed to do very well with this for a good 3-4 months I believe

I would catch him and either put him in a different tank or give him the a LFS

 

[67RedDonzi]

We just pulled him from the tank. He will be going back to the LFS

 

[stravo71]

Yup its the lobster. I had one In my tank for about a month. Every morning we would awake and kick on lights to find another one of our ver y expensive fish played Houdini and just disappeared. So one night I checked and found the lobster with my purple tang in its claws. Here while the fish were sleeping he was grabbing them and eating them. I caught the bugger and took him to our local petco so someone else could adopt him. I recommend you do the same. I heard that even the spiney lobsters do the same. I learned my lesson with lobsters

 

[4FordFamily]

I've had a purple lobster for years with a purple tang, yellow tang, desjardini Sailfin, Achilles tang, powder blue tang, flame angel, yellow watchman goby, diamond sand sifting goby, Vroliks wrasse, radiant wrasse and red hawkfish without any issues.

I had blue chromis and pajama & Bangai Cardinals too but I sold them. IMO they're completely harmless. People say the same stuff about coral banded shrimp but mine have all been fantastic I've kept them for 12 years without issue. Also potters Angels.

I think reefers blame these guys for the deaths of their fish when really ich or some other parasite, poor water conditions, or other issue weakens them and they nearly die only to get eaten afterward.

I had a melanarus that got a chunk taken out of his side (big chunk, looked heinous) in another tank without any shrimp or lobster. No idea what happened but it healed completely in 2 months! Maybe there is hope!