# A cautionary tale about Pistol Shrimp...



## Brackish (Nov 30, 2010)

Hey everyone,

I have a strange story to share with you all, that I hope someone can learn from. The best thing about our hobby is how unique everyone's experiences and systems are and the fact that we can share all of it online to help each other learn from our mistakes or oversights. My current situation is a strange one, at least to me, that I'd like to share. Hopefully it helps someone!

This isn't a standard case of pistol shrimp killing other inverts or knocking over live rock/coral by digging under it. I've had a biocube 14 set up for about two years. It's been fairly stable and good to me over two years and undergone one new aquascape. 

Early on, like most people, I was looking for interesting things to add to the tank. I came across the pistol shrimp/goby combo. The tank was a couple of months old at this time. The two paired up immediately and it was everyone's favourite thing to watch in my tank. I lost the shrimp around the same time I changed the scape. It sucked, but the goby was out and about more often. No lesson learned because I'm not sure what happened.

Fast forward to now. There are basically two schools when it comes to live sand beds. Clean it or don't clean it during maintenance. I am in the latter group. I never disturb my sand bed outside of what my nassarius snails do for me. I was at my LFS and saw a tank that had pistol shrimp and thought hey it would be great to have one of those again. I'm sure the goby would like it too. Brought him home and introduced him to the tank. He paired up with the goby and got to work right away. Over the next week he would try different spots for a little cave all over the tank. This is where the problem begins. 

I think he stirred up about 90% of my sand bed. I started to notice diatoms in low flow areas of the tank. Some zoa colonies that I've had forever with no problems not opening. Do some tests... Ammonia a little bit of a reading... hmm... Nitrate... 100+... ... It turns out that my nearly two year old sand bed had quite a bit of things going on and some nasty stuff trapped in there. I determined that the little shrimp stirring everything, and I mean everything up caused me a HUGE nitrate spike. I'm currently doing daily water changes of 30% to get it under control.

The moral of the story is, if you don't clean your sandbed, have a smaller tank and want to add a pistol shrimp, be careful! He will stir it all up and release all the unpleasantries that your sand has been dealing with and trapping. I hope this helps someone else!!

Thanks everyone, hope you enjoyed my semi-bizarre tale.

Also, over the past few days I have stopped hearing his *click* at night time and have not seen the goby. I think the only casualty from his great work ethic might have been himself!

Thanks, have a good weekend!!

-Brackish

EDIT: I'd like to add that I think pistol shrimp are an amazing addition to almost any aquarium.

EDIT 2: I have read multiple threads about people struggling with an over abundance of spionid worms. The little two tentacle guys that make tubes out of the sand. Spionid worms and pistol shrimp hate each other. I have observed on multiple occasions my goby and shrimp walking around the tank simply so the shrimp can rip their tubes out of the sand. The entire tube, every time. I can only assume he would like them in good condition to mount on the wall of his burrow in a total display of conquest.


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## Ciddian (Mar 15, 2006)

Great tip! I was working with a small tank when I had mine as well. 30 gallons. I cannot recall if I ever had a spike like that but mine didn't burrow as actively as yours since my pair never did bond. 

The watchman tried many times but I just had the wrong shrimp I guess. 

Very very cool pets... I loved mine a lot!


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## Bayinaung (Feb 24, 2012)

ok what if you have those borrowing snails which always are disturbing the sand? does that count as cleaning the sandbed? LOL


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## Brackish (Nov 30, 2010)

Bayinaung said:


> ok what if you have those borrowing snails which always are disturbing the sand? does that count as cleaning the sandbed? LOL


I had 6-10 nassarius prior to the incident. So in my experience, (which for saltwater is limited to 2 years with the biocube) no that doesn't count. Haha as in I don't believe they disturb the sand enough. In my tank they don't move around in the sand as much as I would like. Usually it's just periscope up, periscope down. Haha


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## Bayinaung (Feb 24, 2012)

crap. yeah I love the periscopes LOL. for all the job they do disturbing frags in sandbed they don't disturb it enough I guess! alright a sand vacuum is a good idea for salt water. and then add pistol shrimp after. got it.


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## Brackish (Nov 30, 2010)

Just disturb the sand! You'll be able to get an idea of how dirty your sand is by looking at it through the sides of the tank!


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