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I'll take that pest mantis!!


fishmanmike01

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You have good taste in critters.

 

Let your local fish stores know you're looking for hitchhiker mantis and pistol shrimp if nobody here has one. That's how I got my mantis.

 

And... Mantis shrimp are freakin' awesome. Mine is watching baseball with us right now. I swear he's actually watching the TV.

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Is it a Gonodactylellus viridis? -- http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/arthropoda/crustacea/malacostraca/eumalacostraca/royslist/species.php?name=g_viridis

 

If so, that's what I have. It's an excellent choice. Well, they're all excellent choices, but some of the more intertidal species are very hearty and very active and unlikely to develop shell rot under bright reef lighting.

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Is it a Gonodactylellus viridis? -- http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/arthropoda/crustacea/malacostraca/eumalacostraca/royslist/species.php?name=g_viridis

 

If so, that's what I have. It's an excellent choice. Well, they're all excellent choices, but some of the more intertidal species are very hearty and very active and unlikely to develop shell rot under bright reef lighting.

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Here's the best resource that I've found for identification.

http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/arthropoda/crustacea/malacostraca/eumalacostraca/royslist/index.html#directory

 

Most mantis shrimp have striping, bright colors, mottling or other obvious visual features. Like mine, yours looks pretty dark and fairly plain--at least in comparison to some.

 

In terms of evenly colored smasher mantis, the most common seems to be the green mantis:

 

g_viridis2.jpg

 

Looking at the telson on yours, it pretty closely matches the green mantis. I'm pretty sure that's what mine is, but he's so dark that he looks black. From the picture, they can be quite dark.

 

From what I understand, they can slowly change color with molts depending on their surroundings.

 

Anyhow, that hope this helps! You're going to be amazed by this little guy (or girl).

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Can you keep more than one mantis in the same tank??? I would bet they would kill each other' date=' but that is just a guess...[/quote']

 

Two mantis shrimp in one tank equals one mantis shrimp and one dead mantis shrimp. Unless you can find a male and female of the same species, which is hard to do.

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