4.5 Gallon Pico Reef

[timpetty]

Pictures ASAP

 

[chrissaysyes]

Woot! New lighting and new mantis

The pics arent that great but here goes:

 

[Demm]

you have a mantis in there with corals and stuff? they dont hurt them?

awesome pics, now i'm the one to be jelous. looks really awesome!

what kinda light did you get?

 

[chrissaysyes]

yup mantids do fine with corals. They can break your rocks up but usually won't. This guy is really fun to watch. Got him to eat a silverside earlier, tried to get him to punch a chop stick but he just pulled it out of my hand and freaked me out. The light is amazing. Viper HQI 70w. My first MH lighting setup and I'm in love. Definitely going to upgrade the other tanks with MH.

 

[nanocubeking]

Me like! Love the new light. Great job

 

[chrissaysyes]

Wellll....added frogspawn and FINALLY found some nice xenia frags. The tank is looking great but...the mantis is acting very odd. He's come out of his cave and he's sitting out in the open not responding to any stimulus including food...water params are perfect and the corals are all doing better than ever, even the new frags added this morning. I dont get it On a side note, his color seems off as well...he seems much brighter on his back...kind of the way a lobsters tail looks after being boiled.

 

[chrissaysyes]

Fearing the worst for Mr. Mantis...he's not responding much if any Went ahead and did a water change just because I felt like I should do something Posted at stomatopods.com waiting for a reply.

 

[chrissaysyes]

Aaaaand he's dead.

 

[Demm]

aww man, what happened?? what did stomatopods tell you?

 

[chrissaysyes]

stomatoslowpokes havnt responded yet...Im assuming he's dead...not moving at all...I netted him and took him out of the water for a few seconds and still no movement...not even when I poke him with a stick

 

[chrissaysyes]

Well I dunno #### happened to the little guy...I dont think it was my fault unless perhaps he experienced shock from the lighting upgrade??? Im still trying to contact Billy, the manager of stomatopod.com. Until then, here are some pics...farewell little buddy.

 

[tropicman]

so what now chris are you going to get another mantis??

 

[chrissaysyes]

Hells yeah Im getting another one I only had him for two days and he was already the coolest pet everrrr...aside from my dog. He would walk out and watch me type, I hope the next one is as curious.

Billy and Chris from Stomatopod.com (who are SUPER helpful and accommodating!) both are saying that the lighting is more than likely what did him in. The stress of the upgrade and a lack of a dark shelter probably stressed him over the edge.

Solution: Going to add black PVC to the back of the rock work so he'll have an absolute shelter, also going to raise the lighting fixture to get it a tad bit darker in there. Would revert to PC but that MH is way too cool and the corals love it. I've seen mantids and MH get along before so I see no reason why I cant make this work if I provide some better shelter for him. Also, Im having a dark day whenever the new one arrives.

Billy and Chris have both agreed to credit me so I'll try and have the new one here ASAP.

On a side note...my hammer coral is cool

 

[nanocubeking]

Sorry about the skrimp. But that tank it great. Keep it up. You have hammer coral in there?

 

[chrissaysyes]

Thanks, and yup the hammer frag is pretty small but you can see it in the 3rd pic I posted in the recent pic set post. It's right there above the xenia...see it? It's looking a bit more full today...I fed it before lights out and it seemed to enjoy that. I'm starving the tank for a week though, thinking I may have gone over board on the food in an attempt to get the mantis to eat

Wishing they would respond to me as to if I need to take pics of the corpse cut in half or propped up in front of the eiffel tower or whatever so I can make my girlfriend happy and get this dead critter off of my desk He's just sitting in a cup of freshwater now...luckily it's cold in the office but it wont be much longer before he starts to smell