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Cleaner Shrimp Question


Fmxmatt

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Hey All

I've had 2 Skunk cleaners in my tank for about a month and a half now, both seem to be doing well, and have seen both molt at least 3 times.

My question is to any other Skunk owners, did your cleaners actually clean your fish? If so, did they do it straight away or did it take a while before they started?

I ask because I was watching them last night, both were out on a rock which they frequent usually every night about the same time. Both my Blue Tang and Yellow Tang seemed to line up to be cleaned but all the shrimp did were wave their antenna in the direction of the fish, like they were trying to defend themselves.

I've read that some of them will never clean, but I thought I'd ask in hope that perhaps someone else has had the same experience, and over time the shrimps became more confident?

Cheers :)

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Guest Anonymous

Yes my cleaner shrimp will clean my fish. They will actually swim out off the rock onto the fish and walk around the fishes body cleaning it.

They also come running over to me when I approach the tank and will walk up my hand/arm cleaning that when I put it in the tank.

Do you shrimps clean your hand when you put it in? You maybe able to teach them the behaviour my putting bit of food (cyclopse) on your finger and letting them clean it.

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Although fish like to get cleaned, especially if they have ich or similar, shrimps don't always oblige. They are also most active at night so can still clean up your fish when they are 'sleeping'.

Shrimps also keep under cover more after a moult as they don't have hard bodies straight away.

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and i'm now just this minute watching my blue tang (which i've just noticed tonight has a wee bit of whitespot) follow the cleaners around the tank desperate for them to clean it up. It evens stops swimming and floats on its side so the shrimp get a good view of it.

Stupid Shrimp :(

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Guest Anonymous

Start hand feeding your shrimps. I always do, I will put some shrimp in for the fish then actually hand it to my shrimps who come up onto the rocks and wait for some :) They then take the time to clean my fingers too.

Gotta train some fish :D

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lol, i can't take all the credit, my tank came with my pair of shrimps when i bought it so they may have already been accustomed to it. however, i have to say the first month or so that i had them they were more timid, however one day i tempted them out with a piece of mussel and ever since they've been very tame. Plus both them started cleaning my fish in the last month or so which i hadn't seen them do before. try some mussel, wave it around close to them and try and tempt them out with that, they'll get the msg ;)

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I've read that some of them will never clean, but I thought I'd ask in hope that perhaps someone else has had the same experience, and over time the shrimps became more confident?

They do clean fish if the fish wants to go up to them, some fishes only go up to them if they are sick,

It’s a not true that cleaner shrimp will keep white spot under control, getting cleaner shrimps to help with white spot control is a waste of time.

white spot is embedded in the skin not on the skins surface so to get the parasite out the shrimp has to break through the skin.

Anecdotal evidence seems to support my view that cleaners don’t cure white spot,

I have had up to 400 cleaner shrimps in a tank with 1 fish, the fish still got white spot, you would think with so many cleaner shrimps it will help cure it.

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Guest Anonymous
:evil: :x :evil: :x :evil: :x :evil:

Why wont mine do that!!!!!!!

Hahahaha how long did it take until it would do that? Please dont tell me it did it straight away, just make up some lies or something! :wink:

My CBS took a couple of days to get the courage up, but the cleaner shrimps take only a few minutes. Just be patient and dont move too far from a rock so they feel safe and hold some food for them. Funny enough mine runs past the food and up my arm now too =\ weird animals.

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I'm gunna try hand feeding them tonight. Whats interesting is that I bought both at exactly the same time, they were both the same size, but now 1 is quite alot bigger than the other. Do they have similar mating terms as the clowns? (I.e in a pair, 1 will become dominant and therefore bigger)

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I'm gunna try hand feeding them tonight. Whats interesting is that I bought both at exactly the same time, they were both the same size, but now 1 is quite alot bigger than the other. Do they have similar mating terms as the clowns? (I.e in a pair, 1 will become dominant and therefore bigger)

Talking about cleaner shrimp? If so they are hermaphrodites, which means they are both sexes at once. (Not quite like clowns, which can change sex, but are not both sexes at the same time). Any two cleaner shrimp will mate and produce offspring. They do this on the night one moults. At that point it is impregnated by the other/s, and will then grow eggs, which can be seen in the photo of the one on Jolliollis hand, as the green mass under its abdomen. If you happen to shine a torch in the tank the night they are released, the whole tank is teeming with tiny creatures, and any nocturnal feeders are out in force.

So if you have 2 shrimps, both will be carrying eggs much of the time, assuming they are moulting regularly.

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