Harlequin shrimp

Does anyone have one of these guys in their tank? I've read that they are good at ridding a tank of asterina snails. I've got quite a few. Don't think they are harming anything in my tank, and I know that is usually the case. But, been thinking of trying to eliminate them. I've also read that the asterina snails are the ONLY thing they will eat. So, I'm concerned whether one of them would eat everything quickly and then starve to death. Anyone with experience with them?????

 

They really eat them up but you will have to supplement them with a chocolate chip starfish.

 

??? What do you mean by 'supplement with a chocolate chip starfish'?

 

They chomp through asterina stars but once the numbers get low you will have to keep buying starfish to feed it with or rehome it with someone else. CC stars would likely damage your corals though before finished off by the harlequin. So if you could find another cheap reef safe starfish supply you'd be ok. Another idea would be to house the CC stars in a non-reef tank and chop off arms every couple days to feed it.

 

Mine would eat a whole cc starfish a week if I would let it. I usually would take bone cutters and cut through midsection of starfish and he would come out immediately and grab it and eat it up

 

I used a harlequin to rid my tank of those pest. Had him about a month and rehomed him when his food source was gone. He did his job and did it well.

 

We should have a travelling GIRS Harlequin for members to share.

Get one, clear your tank, send it to the next guy who needs it.

 

That's what I was thinking!!! Or even - the region buys one - and you pay $5 to use it then pass it on. Then if something happened to it at someone's house, the club would have hopefully gotten part of the money back, and it wouldn't be a huge expense.

I don't like the idea of it starving to death - and I don't want to keep buying cc stars for it to eat - or cutting of the legs of cc stars..

@new2salt - do you know if whoever you passed it on to still has it? and/or whether it has eaten everything from their tank???

 

@new2salt - I'm curious as to how good of a job it did for you. How long was it in your tank? How long has it been since you had it in your tank? Have you had any recurrance of them?

 

It did a wonderful job. He was in the tank for around a month and my tank was absolutely covered with them. It's been about two years since I had him in there and they've never returned.(knock on wood) I gave him to one of my friends back home. He has since rehomed him. I talked to the friend I gave it to and he has not had any of them come back to his tank either. The little harly I had did a good job for many people as I bought it off someone in the club from West Des Moines and he used it for the same thing.

 

So - anyone in the club got one they want to pass on?????? Or are there others that would like to share in the cost of getting one and passing him on??

 

Why the war on asterinas? I think they are one of the cool, diverse life forms we have in our tank.. Now a community filefish for aptasia would be great

 

I'd say I would just buy one and then try to rehome them later there around 30 bucks to buy The loaning or splitting cost gets messy sometimes. I had a file fish who cleaned up my tank took him to my friends house and he did a good job there. Brought him back home and he wasn't welcomed back and his former tank mates beat the hell out of him.

 

They just seem to be getting sooooo numerous in my tank that I thought maybe I should get rid of them.