Curing Live Rock and Hitchhikers

[Quiet Reef]

Hi there:

I was reading in Vol.1 of Delbeek and Sprung's The Reef Aquarium, that
one way to rid yourself of unwanted hitchhikers is to put an octopus
in the tank with the live rock, and in short order, it will find and
eat a lot of unwanted stuff, mantis shrimp, etc. Since I've never
seen an Octopus in my city, are there any other creatures, i.e. crabs
that could perform that function?

thanks,
quietreef

[Billy]

"Quiet Reef" > wrote in message
...
> Hi there:
>
> I was reading in Vol.1 of Delbeek and Sprung's The Reef Aquarium,
> that
> one way to rid yourself of unwanted hitchhikers is to put an
> octopus
> in the tank with the live rock, and in short order, it will find
> and
> eat a lot of unwanted stuff, mantis shrimp, etc. Since I've never
> seen an Octopus in my city, are there any other creatures, i.e.
> crabs
> that could perform that function?
>
> thanks,
> quietreef

I can't think of any critter that will only kill HH'ers you don't
want. Anything that will kill and eat a mantis shrimp will likely eat
damn near anything. There are precious few things that commonly show
up in good quality LR that could be called undesireable, and a slew
of good ones. Myself, I just take the chance, and trap the occasional
mantis or crab.