charzar-g

Okay so i've got some live rock in my tank (12kg atm) And i told the lady at the shop i'd be going on holiday soon and I won't add any fish for several weeks because of it (and other stuff, exams etc) So she told my to just add some hermit crabs to keep the filter alive and algae down.

But now that I've added them, they're all over the live rock, now that they've cleaned the sandbed (which was starting to go a little brown) and wat i wanted to ask is:

Won't they completley mow the live rock of anything edible? I've started to notice its getting lighter in colour...Is this bad if they're stripping it of everything??
Also - I found a tiny feather duster on the rock, it goes in pretty fast into a hole, but will the crabs eat it??
And I bought five crabs - but i've just found the remains (a leg and a claw) of one - so what would have killed it? Or would it have died naturally - do the crabs kill each other in competition for shells? Should i put more shells into the tank?

THANKS

charzar-g

bump

Hypnox

The crabs are likely not the cause of the LR getting lighter in color. If this is a brand new tank the LR will go through a dying phase where the coralline algae dies and becomes lighter then will darken up again.

The hermit crab that died was likely killed over competition for its shell or it left its shell and was attacked by the hermits that still had a shell. Or you found the remains of a molt.

They will most likely leave the feather duster alone.

charzar-g

thanks thats cleared that up
And yeah the tank is brand new - so that is probably the reson for the colour change

Thanks!

charzar-g

Just a quick update - i found the fith crab now - so musta been a moult