cracking noise at night....

[mopar9012]

well everynight when i go to bed I can hear this cracking noise coming from my fish tank. The noise is rather load, not to where is disturbs my sleep but the tank is in my room and I can hear it over my fan, my fan is pretty loud...

Early in the set up on the tank I lost a goby and a wrasse. I have noticed that my blue legged hermit crabs have seem to have been slowly decreasing. I currently have a mandarin and have had him for maybe a month and a half to two months and seems to be doing fine.

Do you think this could be a pistol shrimp? I have not SEEN anything like molting but I fear that if I have a pistol shrimp he could continue take the lives of some more fish...that I would like to keep.

also I just looked some info about pistol shrimp and it said something about it stunning its prey but be fed flakes and does well in reef aquariums...
Any ideas?

 

[mopar9012]

oh yeah when I hear the cracking it is always when the lights are out...I have actually heard it recently after the first 5 or 10 minutes of me turning on the lights.

 

[mockery]

Either pistol or mantis shrimp. Where is your LR from??

 

[sra_chipmunk]

Mantis???

 

[mopar9012]

I actually got half my live rock years ago from ebay..haha
but then I set up a bigger tank and bought about 80LBs of it from tattoocliff from this site.
before I bought the rock from him I never heard any problems.

If i wasnt mistake he said he had one of those shrimp but they had already caught it? maybe not?

 

[mopar9012]

2 fish did.

if it is a mantis or a pistol..should I try getting it out? how would i go about doing so.

 

[smoothie]

The plastic bottle method works unless you can narrow it down to which rock it is coming from and dip it.

 

[mopar9012]

dawgdude;419617 wrote: Why fish went missing? If its a mantis then your best bet is a trap. If its a pistol, your fish died and were eaten by something. For mantis hunting I suggest a baited trap, red led flashlight, case of beer and a comfy chair in front of the tank for a night.

i have no idea why they went missing... I detected no spike.
a trap like the ones I see all the time at the LFS or say custom one?

 

[mopar9012]

Smoothie;419618 wrote: The plastic bottle method works unless you can narrow it down to which rock it is coming from and dip it.

what o you do with the bottle? I have never tried to catch anything in my tanke with a "trap".

could this thing hit my hand?

 

[drnecropolis]

If its a mantis and large enough it can break fingers..(assuming its a smasher and not a slasher) If you can determine what rock its in if you can take it out you can dip it in club soda or super saline water and it will shoot right out..

 

[smoothie]

Cut the top off a little above where the neck/cone meets the body, flip it around and put it inside the bottle. Add some bait and do as Charlie said afterwards with a red lensed flashlight and drink of choice.

 

[rbredding]

Wouldnt he have heard the cracking noise before now if it was a hitchiker on LR that has been in his tank for a while ?

 

[smoothie]

Not if it was little. I have found rogue crabs 1yr after intoducing a rock. Saw the little baby claws digging their way out of the rock.

 

[mopar9012]

would a piece of brine shrimp inside the bottle work well?

 

[hackman72]

dawgdude;419678 wrote: I have just purchased normal shrimp from kroger and it worked great. Its like filet mignon compared to what they are used to.

and you get to eat the left overs.

 

[mopar9012]

Hackman72;419724 wrote: and you get to eat the left overs.

lol....



i plan on attempting to catch him tonight when i get off work..
i will let you know if I get him...

 

[corigan]

Good luck.

 

[mopar9012]

:bash2:no luck...
was putting the bottle in and I even heard the cracking...after that...
NOTHING

 

[mopar9012]

planning it...its a pain..i have to turn off all power heads otherwise the bottle doesnt stay put.

 

[oil_fan]

You catch the guy yet?