Crayfish doin the nasty and i need help

[Krisvalkyrie]

Re: Crayfish doin the nasty and i need help

I was moving my 55 gallon, and decided to take the opportunity to take my electric blue out of there and toss it in with two of my other electric blues.  This was my first one, and I always referred to it as "she" and I guess I was right - no sooner do I put her in the tank than the other crawfish in there (I thought of them as male) pounced on her and pinned her claws.  It was kind of funny.

[jeebus]

Re: Crayfish doin the nasty and i need help

We got a blue crayfish a couple of months ago. Big mistake!  We thought he was sooo cool at first, hiding in his log all the time.  Then we notice fish missing, one by one.  Well after the 3rd fish went missing, one morning I found him/her in another part of our tank, eating our pleco.  Which I didn't even know plecos were tasty or edible!  I was really upset, but before we could moved him/her out, it ended up eating another crayfish (while it was molting) and one of our cichlids.  I finally had enough, isolated him, and two days later he somehow got out and made his way to our breakfast room where he died.  

Well we recently got a new one, and he is about 1/2 an inch long, and afraid of the fishes!  He hides under a rock and I have to stick my hand in and put a shrimp pellet next to his hiding hole so he doesn't have to complete with the bigger fish for food.  Hopefully this one will work out better than the last one!

[ghoastgirl1]

Re: Crayfish doin the nasty and i need help

We got a blue crayfish a couple of months ago. Big mistake!  We thought he was sooo cool at first, hiding in his log all the time.  Then we notice fish missing, one by one.  Well after the 3rd fish went missing, one morning I found him/her in another part of our tank, eating our pleco.  Which I didn't even know plecos were tasty or edible!  I was really upset, but before we could moved him/her out, it ended up eating another crayfish (while it was molting) and one of our cichlids.  I finally had enough, isolated him, and two days later he somehow got out and made his way to our breakfast room where he died.  

Well we recently got a new one, and he is about 1/2 an inch long, and afraid of the fishes!  He hides under a rock and I have to stick my hand in and put a shrimp pellet next to his hiding hole so he doesn't have to complete with the bigger fish for food.  Hopefully this one will work out better than the last one!

Sounds to me like you have no business having a florida blue crayfish if you're blaming your ignorance on the crayfish for putting it in with other fish that it would have easy access to...especially a pleco. Not to mention isolating him and then seeming relieved that he escaped and died. And after all that...you go get another one. Give it to someone who will do the proper research on the species and take decent care of it...that just makes my stomach turn.  :evil:

[jeebus]

Re: Crayfish doin the nasty and i need help

right, cause we all always get something right on our first try  :?



EDIT: Well Ghostgirl, you managed to anger my wife (who originally posted this reply), which she is now directing at me - on the first week of football season no less. So, just for that, I'm gonna run down to Cho Saigon (local Vietnamese market), pick-up about 10 pounds of crawfish, and boil them in your honor.

Thanks for nothing.

[Spot86t]

Re: Crayfish doin the nasty and i need help

Take it easy on 'em ghoastgirl1...
I'm sure they weren't really happy about the loss - but I know it may have seemed like a relief.  They coulda flushed him or cooked him like some do with fish they just don't want.  
I think we've all had our share of getting something and later finding out that maybe we wish we hadn't.  

I'll confess that happened to me when I got a cute green spotted puffers at walmart (Sale for 2.99!).  Then I read about them.  What a regret - a brackish tank just for him??!!    I won't say I didn't wish ill on him but I wouldn't have replaced him if somthing bad happened.  Redemption for him was being a portable snail cleaner while his tank cycled (using frozen shrimp).  Then I adapted him to brackish, got him a buddy (someone elses impulse buy), and a couple of silver scats and it ended up being a nice source of entertainment for a good while.  I was still relieved when I found a new home for the GSP's and am changing the scats back over to freshwater so I have one less tank to keep up.  

Jeebus - thanks for answering one thing I've wondered for a long time - whether they'd bother with a pleco, seeing as how armored they are....

Your new little guy will be afraid of the fishes at first, cause he's little (aka bite-sized), but be aware that when he gets bigger he'll likely be much like your earlier one.  Choose smart, fast fish - preferably that stay in the upper water column.  By smart I mean not fish like Kuhli loaches, which are fast, but swim spastically around - I had one of those swim right into the claw of an austrailian cray.  I saved him but it made me realize just how quick those crays are.  Smart fish will learn to sleep in the plants.  I had 2 clown loaches, 4 corys, a peacock eel and guppies with a blue cray for a while (until the eel got stupid).  Then I got him his own space.  Your little guy will still go after tiny fish most likely (like guppy fry sized).   Remember also that most fish sleep on the bottom at night, and crays go hunting at night.  So don't keep him(or her) with something that it would bother you to lose - they're just doing what nature intended and IMHO, I don't think it's our place to try and alter that, but we can be selective about it.  

Here's a list of what I've kept with crays over the last several years and a scale of 1-5 (1 being dumbest) on the 'smartness' rating.....

guppies 3
hatchetfish 5
neon tetras 2
mollies 1
rummynose tetras 2
large goldfish 5 (pond environment)
golden chinese algae eater 5 (same pond)
wild caught minnows 5 (pond and in tanks)
kuhli loaches 1
clown loaches 3 (i think they're too skittish to be an easy catch)
kribs 4

That's all I can think of that I've tried, although when I've had a cray with no claws (i.e. a loser in a cray fight), i've put them in with just about anything, and they  still lurch at fish, but have no means of catching any but the most stupid.  Once they molt and harden, back into the cray tank or pond they go....

With regard to other crays, their cray tankmates seem to know when one molts and they know it'd be an easy lunch(they're as soft as warm butter after a molt!).  The molted one knows this, but can't even walk well until it's legs harden.  I've seen a crew watching one, seemingly just waiting for it to finish molting so they can dive in.  Of course, I very carefully remove the 'snack' and it's shell until it has eaten the shell (don't give it any food until the shell is gone), and has the ability to defend itself, then back it goes.

They are indeed a great entertainment though, once you realize the other risks involved.

btw - a snug lid is definately required.  I've seen these guys dig their pointly little legs into the silicone in tank corners and reach the top, and an air line is nothing but a rope ladder to them.  They can go through smaller holes than you would think - mine have amazed me on more than one occasion.

[jeebus]

Re: Crayfish doin the nasty and i need help

Well, he ate two Tiger-barbs which we had for about 3 months that we used for cycling. The fish that caught us off guard getting eaten was a very fast, very dominant, and very aggressive little blue Pseudotropheus. She (females are blue) was Queen of the roost and for the first two months shared a log with the crawfish.

We realized the Pseudo was missing one morning, but didn't have time to do anything about it (we were both leaving for work). We talked about moving the crawfish that night, but by the time we got home, he had started eating the Pleco. EDIT: My wife is telling me it ate the Pleco first, which is why we figured there were no other fish it could eat, as the rest were too fast - then we found the blue Pseudo missing.

After that he was quarantined with the other baby crawfish, where he ate him too. How do you explain that one Ghostgirl?

[JStrider]

Re: Crayfish doin the nasty and i need help

them eating their own species isn't uncommon either... especially if its smaller and they get it right after its molted... it happens...

always have to consider any tankmates potential dinner once they get big enough

my crays caught bloodfin tetras pretty regularly... and bloodfins are fast and stay top/middle of the water column...

[ghoastgirl1]

Re: Crayfish doin the nasty and i need help

Well I can explain why he ate the other baby cray once you quarentined him...crayfish are cannibals as Spot mentioned earlier.

I've had my share of learning experiences with the crays however I did ask a lot of questions before getting in deep with them.
I will think more about the words I choose next time. If your wife is going to be posting under your name perhaps she should join the site and explain herself in certain topics when different opinions are expressed and clash. Just my two cents.... this is the end of my input on this subject.

[jeebus]

Re: Crayfish doin the nasty and i need help

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