Oh No.....I found a spider in my Salt Tank

I've been trying to find it in the bio cube but it is white and the sand is light. The cloud is clearing and my magnifying glass and I still don't see it. Do you suppose it is in one of the rocks I moved or was under some of the coral. As fast as it is, I don't believe it got siphoned out and flushed. I was pretty careful about moving the vaccum too fast. I knew people wanted to see it. I was torn between killing it and getting a closer look at it. I hope I never see it again....but on the other hand.... I'm not too keen on the idea of killing something that may be pretty rare.
I know it liked the mushrooms so I checked them very carefully. I knew where it was hanging out and i should have waited to get a pic... I hate spiders.
There was a lot of coral in the tank so I picked up each rock and looked around it. Not sure if it got past me or not but I am going to wait before filling it hoping I can get a picture of it for everyone. At this point, I am not sure where it is.
Here is a picture of the bio cube before I tore it up (I know...Cyno and long hair algae issues...I'm dealing with it). The spider was seen twice on the left hand side under the red and blue mushrooms and yesterday, when my friend found its hiding place, it ran toward the middle of the back of the tank and hid. It did not swim, it ran like a crab but faster.
I put my camera next to the tank just in case I need it and will keep looking for the little critter. I'll keep everyone posted.

 

:laughingsThat's way too funny. If they let me name it, it would be the "You Gotta Go Spider" spider

 

There's no way a terrestrial spider would adapt to live in seawater overnight... whatever this thing is, it is oceanic.

 

I think we are talking about Sea Spiders...... Pycnogonids.


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Sent from Tapatalk, so please forgive grammar and spelling

 

Well I hope you get it out! The proble is that there are so many different variations and species of these that you may never find out what it is. The one thing you can be sure of is that if it is indeed a sea spider, there are NONE that you want in your tank! Not just for aesthetic purposes but for tank safety.

 

I didn't think I wanted to keep it either, hubby did, I don't. Right now I am curious as to what it is. I did look up the images of the Sea Spider and found nothing even close to what I saw.

I took a pretty good look at my tank this morning. Still nothing except the usual clean up crew, some star fish, and what I believe to be fuzzy sea slugs (not sure what they are) and the pods and frags I left in there. I will check again when I get off work to see if if it is there.

 

Are you sure? It seems that Pycnogonids come in many colors shapes and sizes.

Marine Invertebrates - Sea Spiders (Pycnogonida)

"[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Sea Spiders — Class Pycnogonida [/FONT] Pycnogonids (pyc="thick"; gonida="knees") are usually called sea spiders because of their superficial resemblance to true, terrestrial spiders. Pycnogonids have a wide geographical distribution, occupying every ocean on the planet at various depths – from very shallow areas to nearly 7 km!"



SeaSpiderFAQs

 

I looked at a lot of photos and the Flower Crab was the closest. I'm not sure what species it is, whether it is Zoa eating (I've never seen him close to mine) or if it is a meat eater but I'm really curious now and will keep looking in the tank trying to find him.

 

I wasn't actually trying to ID it. I just wanted to point out that when we are talking about spiders, we're referring to the Sea Spider.

 

my last reply was directed at this comment, where the OP was seemingly talking about a terrestrial spider: