Your acan ate my hermit! (Pics)

[jservedio]

The vicious reverse bleeding apple acan bowerbankii I got from you a bit over a year ago just devoured my oldest and biggest hermit crab buddy! LPS are just supposed to be picked at and bothered by hermits - not fight back. **** you for giving me such a healthy coral that was able to grow incredibly fast from a single polyp to being able to scarf down a LIVE and fighting hermit crab...

I went to target feed my acans and this hermit dropped off of a ledge above to snatch the food out of my acans mouths and this time it fell on the bowerbankii before I fed it... RIP hermit....

 

[phillrodrigo]

That's crazy

 

[reefingnoob]

Haha that's nuts!!!!!

 

[uniquecorals]

That's pretty much one of the coolest pics ever...

Yeah, I forgot that you purchased a "Venus Fly Trap" Bowerbanki and mis-labeling it as a "Reverse Bleeding Apple..." :smile:

 

[jservedio]

That's pretty much one of the coolest pics ever...

Yeah, I forgot that you purchased a "Venus Fly Trap" Bowerbanki and mis-labeling it as a "Reverse Bleeding Apple..." :smile:

I couldn't believe my eyes as it was going on. That picture is actually about 16 or 18 hours after the initial "event." The coral only took a couple seconds to grab hold of the hermit, but the crab struggled for a good 15 or 20 minutes before it actually died... Normally when a crab or fish nips an acan, they deflate - but it was in eating mode and the crab was striking out but it didn't let up - it just kept tightening its hold. Within a half hour the polyp was completely wrapped around the shell and you couldn't see the shell at all. I didn't witness the actual "consumption" of the crab itself since I went to bed about an hour after the struggle and couldn't see it anymore, but woke up to a half consumed crab. When I got home from work yesterday, just the tip of the shell was poking out and it was back in feeding mode. I'll have to take another picture when I get home today if it actually gets the entire shell down.

 

[jcdeng]

it can't digest the shell, take it out asap before it does some damage to the beautiful acan.

 

[jservedio]

it can't digest the shell, take it out asap before it does some damage to the beautiful acan.

It'll expel the shell on it's own in a few days. I've seen lords take down ceriths and nassarius with much less room inside (the polyp that ate the crab is about 3" across) and they got it back out on their own. I've read that pulling a shell (or any other object) out from a coral that is clamped down on it like that can do much, much more damage than just letting it do it's thing on its own.

 

[jcdeng]

ok, just remember that mouth of the acan is also its anus.

 

[jservedio]

ok, just remember that mouth of the acan is also its anus.

The acan is basically Cartman from South Park:
[video=youtube;4G7kE62unns]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4G7kE62unns[/video]

 

[jservedio]

Also, if they don't expel the shell, it still won't hurt the acan and they grow right over it. One of my friends in NC had one of his acan lords eat a hermit (shell first, he has a picture with the legs sticking out of the mouth) and it never expelled the shell (albeit it was a smaller shell than mine). The acan just built the shell into it's skeleton and grew over it.

 

[Gopi]

That is just crazy! Thanks for documenting it!

 

[RalphsReef]

LOL, I was wondering if anyone was going to reference South Park on this.

 

[loz]

wow your bowerbanki looking hungry very cool pic

 

[jservedio]

Well it finally spit the shell back out yesterday - no crab or crab shell left in it, completely empty!