cleaner shrimp

[btodd43]

does anybody know what to feed cleaner shrimp? ours is hanging out on top of the heater and won't go over to the live rock,Thanks,
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Honda VF400F

 

[Anonymous]

They will eat pretty much anything you feed to your other inhabitants. They will sometimes choose odd places to call home, I had one that was quite content living in between the overflow box and the back wall of the tank.

 

[btodd43]

thanks- Should I not have the sponge in the back compartment (only live rock and a pump) and do I turn off the pump when I feed?
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Stock paintball

 

[Anonymous]

Try to hand feed it a piece of food. Move slowly and wave the food back in forrth in front of it so the antenna can check it out.

 

[Anonymous]

Cool. When I had a cleaner shrimp it would crawn up my arm when I had it in the tank.

 

[Anonymous]

Mine liked to clean under my nails 8O which I thought was cool 8)

Bill, your cleaner will eat almost anything and everything that you feed the tank and it will more than likely eat right out if your hands/fingers

 

[btodd43]

Cool- thanks- I've been reading that I should take out the sponge filter in the back compartment altogether-and fill it all in with live rock, and I'm supossed to shut down the pump when I feed what do you think?
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deep chunk strawberry cough strain

 

[Anonymous]

In my case, I took out all filter media and replaced with rock rubble.

The only reason to turn off the pump is for spot feeding your corals. You don't want the food to "blow" out of them before they can eat. For the shrimp, it doesn't matter, he should eat from your hand and he'll also catch stuff blowing around in the tank, not to mention picking stuff off the rock.

 

[btodd43]

Ok- I bought that filter pad stuff to put on top of the foam filter( Purichem?) should I take out the foam and put the pad on top of the live rock rubble? Thanks,
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Teen Pregnancy Forum

 

[Anonymous]

I would remove the foam, the rock will do everything you need as far as filtration goes and ONLY use the filter pad on the days (every few days or at least on water change days) that you blast the rock, then remove it. You know about blasting rock, right?

Ok, in case you don't. Get a cheap plastic turkey baster and use it to blow the crud off your rock so that you have a "snow storm" in your tank. The filter pad will collect all the crud (or at least most of it) and keep it from breaking down in the tank. Make sure to let everything settle and water is clear before removeing the filter pad. When done on water change days, you can use a hose to syphon the remaining crud from the sand bed and then add your new salt water.