How to safely get a porcelain crab out of a rock

[tlhood]

I have a piece of base rock (figures) that I want to take out of the tank and fresh water dip since there are some starfish type things in it that I can't identify. Seriously their legs are like as thin as a strand of hair but they stretch out across my sand for a good half a foot. Since I can't ID them (they don't match anything I've found on micro brittle stars) I want to get them out to make sure they don't start snacking on my snails.

Anywho, I have a bunch of bumblebee snails and a porcelain crab that live in the inner caves of this rock. The bumble bees are easy enough to get out since they come out during feeding time, but the porcelain is very shy and usually sits at the front of a cave and darts in as soon as it sees movement. Is there a way to get it out of the rock safely without killing it?

[hillegom]

put some food in a deep glass jar and lean it up close to his hideout.
As well as filter feeding they also are carnivores. Hopefully, the crab will enter the glass jar/drinking glass, and then be unable to climb out of the smooth sides
GL

[tlhood]

Oh and I don't have a sump to throw the rock in.

[tlhood]

put some food in a deep glass jar and lean it up close to his hideout.
As well as filter feeding they also are carnivores. Hopefully, the crab will enter the glass jar/drinking glass, and then be unable to climb out of the smooth sides
GL

Alright I will try that. Fingers crossed!

[Delphinus]

Can you post a picture of these starfish legs stretching out that far?

[tlhood]

I certainly can try, I will take a picture when the lights turn on again. There is a whole clump of legs sticking out of one cave right now, but they aren't stretched as far as they can go. I'll post a picture later this afternoon. Some of them are white with black knobs, and some of them are red with faint black knobs. I assume its a starfish by the way it extends, grabs on to something (usually Mysis) and then pulls it back towards the cave. It could be some creepy mutant sea monster, all I've ever seen are 'legs'.

And my Crab-trap jar is in the way right now, though my porcelain crab seems uninterested in the goodies in it.

[tlhood]

Here is a picture of the shorter red leg things (there's easily 10 of them), you can barely see the white ones (that are super stretchy).

Unfortunately the rock is at an angle, I don't have a waterproof camera, and my lens doesn't let me get in very close.

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y224/tabkatz/star0152.jpg (http://s6.photobucket.com/user/tabkatz/media/star0152.jpg.html)

[reefwars]

its a spaghetti worm not a starfish;)

harmless but i personally get rid of anything that breeds that fast:)


cheers

denny

[tlhood]

Ok, if that is the case, I still need to try to get my crab out of the rock so I can get rid of the worm. Stubborn crab. :cry:

It's good to know it isn't going to like... reach up and attack my fish in the middle of the night. Thanks!

[reefwars]

Ok, if that is the case, I still need to try to get my crab out of the rock so I can get rid of the worm. Stubborn crab. :cry:

It's good to know it isn't going to like... reach up and attack my fish in the middle of the night. Thanks!

they are harmless if it helps any your bumblebee snails are probably eating them lol

baited trap will work though if you still want to get them out:)


cheers

denny

[toytech]

For the second time today ill recommend a yellow corris wrasse if you have the space for another fish , they eat all kinds of nasty worms . Mine ate all my bristle worms ,and peanut worms .

[StirCrazy]

I wouldn't worry about that, just another critter to increase the diversity of your sand. I used to have lots of thoes, never did any harm.

I think a lot of people these days are in to much of a hurry to get rid of anything they didn't put in there, for me discovering new things that just "showed up" was part of the excitment. yes there are knowen nasty things that if you see, get rid of them, but this isn't one in my opinion.

Steve

[Delphinus]

+1 just leave it be. It's a detritus scavenger, kinda nice to have.