Stomatopod Diet?

[travisurfer]

First off, I live on the coast in Southeastern coast near Wrightsville Beach to be exact. Anyway, I can catch some shrimp from the marshes and get some little snails from the marsh as well. Would these be good food items for a G. glabrous/graphurus? Or I can just go and get a pound of fresh shrimp, freeze them, and soak them in selcon before feeding? I want to provide a good staple food in addition to a constant supply of snails, hermits, and the occasional emerald crab. Any thoughts?

[JmLee]

heres my experience so far. i have a O.S and for some reason she is very picky, for example. If the food has been frozen for too long, she will just throw it back at me when i hand it to her. this includes tiger shrimp, mysis and silversides which she never liked in the first place. so this is what i do now. I will take out one frozen tiger shrimp and boil it for a few minutes, after that i take it out and soak it into some supplement i.e selcon. after that she devours it lol. Also for what ever reason, she has stoped hunting for hermits, actually im gona put a post on that, but yeah good luck!.

[travisurfer]

ok thanks, i am going to get some frozen shrimp and selcon then. the snails will at least last until saturday since there are still about 7 snails left.

[travisurfer]

do you feed full shrimp? does it matter what species of shrimp it is? my grocery store has fresh white tail shrimp for $4.99 a pound. could I use those?

[JmLee]

i dont think it would matter what kinda shrimp it is. A little goes a long ways, i usually buy three tiger shrimp and i wrap them up well so they dont get to much frost burn. Then ill boil one, chop a small piece and give it to my mantis. Then i refrigerate the rest of it.

[Gonodactylus]

Whoa! No self respecting stomatopod would eat a cooked shrimp. They are much better off eating raw shrimp. We buy tiger or white shrimp, freeze them, and cut them still frozen into feeding sized pieces with a single edged razor blade. Given that we have to feed about 400 stomatopods at a time and that they vary in size from 10 to 330 mm, it is relatively easy to prepare small cubes of shrim of the appropriate sizes.

[travisurfer]

Ok thanks, I wasnt planning on cooking it. Im going to go out and get some raw white shrimp for him. Then I will order some selcon online to enhance his diet.

[travisurfer]

I ended up with fresh white shrimp which are being frozen and zelcoe as a supplement.

[Agu]

Beware of FRESH shrimp and other fresh seafood.

It's legal and a common practice to use sodium tripolyphosphate (STP) as a preservative of shrimp, scallops, and other seafood. Not only does it preserve the food it also causes the seafood to absorb moisture which is better for the seller as water is cheap. However I can't see it being good for your tank to add unnecessary phosphates to your tank.

Buy only chemical free seafood, it's usually designated as "dry" at your retailer.



fwiw,

[travisurfer]

It was on ice at the local food store. Is there anyway I can tell that sodium triphosphate was used?

[Agu]

In my local stores there's a designation of "Dry" in small print on the price tag if no TSP was used.

Most of the shrimp on ice was probably previously frozen. It's rare to get real "fresh" shrimp unless it's locally caught.

The frozen bagged stuff will usually have info about any preservatives. And that'll only have been through one freeze cycle.

While you're there check for mixed frozen seafood bags. It's a mixture with shrimp, scallops, squid, oysters, clams,fish etc, or some variation thereof. Typically it's all raw (except the oysters) and has no preservatives. If your local store doesn't carry it try an Asian market. Chop up some of each for your mantis and blenderize the rest for fish food for your other tank(s).

[travisurfer]

I dont want to waste the shrimp. I think it was farm raised. I guess I could go back and ask the store if tsp was used. Its only phosphates right?

[dantodd]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7749520#post7749520 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by travisurfer
First off, I live on the coast in Southeastern coast near Wrightsville Beach to be exact.

I don't know what state that is in but many southeastern states have locally caught shrimp available that has never been frozen. My mom lived in the Florida keys for some time and there were often shrimp available that were truly fresh (in fact I've even been out shrimping myslef.)

I'm quite sure he'd be happy eating those shrimp.

Dr. Roy might know if there are any pathogens or parasites that might be introduced this way that would otherwise be killed by flash freezing.

[travisurfer]

If thats the case I can catch my own shrimp. The state is NC.

[travisurfer]

He went right after the white shrimp soaked in zoecon. Thanks everyone.

[JmLee]

i dunno, my mantis wont take frozen shrimp unless its really fresh or its cooked.

[travisurfer]

its only been frozen for 2 days. im going to feed him again today.

[Agu]

Do you have coquina clams that far north ? They're tiny clams < 1/2 inch long that live in the sand at the shoreline. I collect a few of those whenever I go to the beach as a free fresh food. They won't survive in our tanks long term but that's not a problem, my n wennerae can eat three or four or of them easily..........

[travisurfer]

Really? I have tons of those. Easy to catch too. I can get a few after surfing. I found a place where I can catch local mantis so I may have to setup a second local only tank. :)