harlequin shrimp

mushroom_man · 02-05-2005, 01:06 PM

does anyone know which starfish the harlequin shrimp eats, and if so can you breed the starfish so that you dont have to spend the money on them every time your shrimp needs to eat? i have been thinking about buying a pair for like 6 months now. but im not going to if i cant feed it... :'( thanks to all that post

Jay · 02-05-2005, 01:34 PM

I think they eat the stars that breed like flies in your sand bed. But I also think they will eat any star that will hols still long enough. I have never had one of those shrimps but I have seen people here that have one. Get the stars that breed in your sand and make sure there is plenty of them before you buy your shrimp. Someone else must know about these better than I.

Jay

OoNickoC · 02-05-2005, 10:33 PM

They will eat chocolagte stars easy....also eats asternia sp.......if you goto a LFS and scour thier lr and reef tanks you should find some....get a bunch and they will propagate in good conditions. Although thier harm to reefs is debated but IME negligable. I used to give the H. shrimp a work the chocolate stars as they are usually availible year round if you can find multiple dealers.

mushroom_man · 02-06-2005, 10:40 AM

ya but sea; what do those asternia sp. look like. and do the cc and asternia starfish breed easily? i want to breed them. remember im not going to the lfs to buy the food i want to produce my own...i have heard that theyll take alot of starfish but i want the cheapest food source available.

Gresham · 02-06-2005, 03:26 PM

Asternia sp. would be a 1/20 a meal for a harlequin shrimp IMO. They need a larger food source, one that you won't be able to propigate on your own. If there food source of stars runs out, they eat your brittles and serpeants. Once that food source is gone, they'll starve in under a month.

Gresham · 02-06-2005, 03:27 PM

Chocalate chip stars would be your cheapest route to feeding them. Once a week to bi-weekly.

mushroom_man · 02-06-2005, 05:54 PM

whats the average price on cc stars? i dont like them so i never got them or checked them out...;P i heard that they eat corals... im really thinking about getting these guys i just got to get the coral banded out of there. ohhhhh also i fogot that i have a sand sifting star will they eat him/she/it?

Astalie · 02-06-2005, 07:57 PM

You can try this place:

http://www.ipsf.com/#anchor47808

they say that they breed redily in a closed system, so if you have a sump you can stick em in there, if not just go get a cheap 10 gallon (they were $7 at Petsmart the other day) and breed them for your shrimp. Plus since their brittle stars they wont hurt your corals if you do put them in your display tank. Hope this helps!

Gresham · 02-07-2005, 11:49 AM

The mini brittles won't do much for how hungary they get. They can cosume an entire large starfish in under a week, and be out begging in another day or two

Chocolate Chips shold go for 4-10 bucks depending on the stores mark up.

OoNickoC · 02-07-2005, 06:00 PM

I fed mine a small chocalate chip evey 3 weeks..... Also found alot of asternia for him at work that i threw in occasionally.He was fine for sometime until he was eaten by a RA. Just make sure you have a reliable food source and are willing to pay for it before buying these lil guys/gals. BTW they stay very small....like 1 3/4" on the upper end of the scale.