SPS commensal crab/acclimation question

[sdt5150]

Of the 30+ non-staghorn, wild caught acros i have in my reef, almost all have at least one, if not several commensal sps crabs living in them. all of these crabs have 'freeloaded' into my reef on the acro they arrived in from the vendor (which i'm not complaining about since i'm very careful about making sure they don't use their home as a food source), and many i don't even see until after placement into my reef.

i acclimate all my sps the same way...15-20 minute bag float, followed by an immediate iodine bath for several minutes in a seperate tub of water taken directly from my aquarium, and finally a rinse and placement into the reef. there is no gradual acclimation period of adding water slowly to the bag. everything else (fish, inverts etc) gets drip acclimated over a period of time.

so my question is this....are these crabs bullet-proof, or are there some species of inverts that just don't need acclimation? also, is there any benefit of using iodine on other inverts during acclimation? as far as i can tell, i haven't lost a crab yet, and many molt on a regular basis.

thanks,
Doug

 

[ReefLion]

Apparently those crabs are bullet-proof. What's the iodine for? Never heard of anyone doing that before. Thanks.

Tim

 

[Emperator]

an iodine dip is done to kill any pathogens that may come along with a wild acro.

it also seems to me that the acro crabs are pretty much bulletporrf if they are alive and kicking in your tank.

 

[ReefLion]

Is iodine used mainly for SPS, or is it worthwhile or LPS and softies? Boy I've really hijacked this thread. Sorry about that.

Tim

 

[Emperator]

Iodine can be used as a preventive dip for basically any coral that you place in your tank

 

[Kevin Day]

mine apparently aren't bulletproof. I do a slow acclimation process on everything just out of habit, and i've lost about half of my acro crabs within a day after placing the coral in my tank.