is it safe to

[sher]

is it safe to put thos sps crabs in the tank? the ones that come on the sps when u buy them.

[FishKid]

thats a question with a very iffy answer... The crabs may be good to put in, chances are that you can put them in. But there are crabs that are bad too... the best thi=ng for any hobbyist to do, is to ;have "critter cage" standing by, and if you do see some crabs, put them in there, until you are able to get an ID on them. If you cant get an ID, you can always put a few lbs of sand in that cage, and an aquaclear 150, and you have yourself a crab tank HTH

mark

[tomt]

Hi Sher,
Its not worth the risk!Like FishKid its risky at best! More often then not some crabs can go 'evil' and eat things that you don't want them to. IMO. I've had crabs in the reef tank go 'evil' and they can be hard to remove from the tank....
Tom

[Rod Buehler]

Yes very safe, actually benifical to the SPS. ocasionally there are little harry brown SPSS crabs with blue eyes, that do munchh on SPS polyps, but not enough to do dammage. The porcelin crabs on the SPS are completely safe.
If you are talking about larger crabs or rock crabs, the other posts were right on.. not wort the risk, but the small SPS crabs are great!

[sher]

thenks every body.

thanks RB, i wasn't sure so i took them out, i'll put them back in.

[SPasse]

Sher,

The crabs that are sps symbiotic are actually beneficial for the coral.

I had a acropora that was damaged when I got it and the sps crab that came with it dutifully kept hair algae off of it until the damaged area re-grew.

Other crabs certainly can be problematic, but the sps symbiotic are neat additions to a reef.

Regards,

Scott Passe

[Ironreef]

a common sps crab is smooth with a mask= bandit crab the eat alga ect help the sps. usually the ones that come with wild sps the smooth ones are good. leave them

[sher]

thanks for the help guys,

they are back in and are looking happy(i think)!

[tubs]

I've had tons of crabs both the bandit and hairy and have not had probs with any of them. There is a natural commensal (supplementary) relationship between the two. The crabs are provided a secure home and do keep the SPS clean of debris and algae overgrowth. They also do eat slime off of the SPS as well but don't believe it to be in any harmful amounts. The coral itself benefits with the housekeeping provided by the crabs.