Got my Mangroves!

[BL00DYMARY]

I ordered Mangroves from Ebay.. just got them today. I put six of them in the tank with the crabs, and put the other 9 in my fish tank for safe keeping. I just wanted to highly recommend that seller to everyone. I won the auction for 12 mangroves for $9.45 + shipping.. but he sent me 15! He also has a website if you don't feel like bidding: http://www.ZenReef.com

[Kali_Ma]

Congratulations! Your crabs must be thrilled.

[Felicity Loves Animals]

CONGRATS Mary!!!!!!!! That's great, he does seem like a nice guy!!!!

[Jennifer Leatherwood]

Whats the deal with the mangroves? Do the crabs eat them? And do they have any particular lighting requirements? I would like to introduce some live plants into my crabitat, I had bamboo but I couldn't figure out if it was real bamboo or not so I took it out so that my crabs wouldn't eat it.
Jenn

[Kali_Ma]

Do crabs eat mangroves?

Does a bear do you know what, you know where?

I got going on this whole mangrove thing as a way to replace the Gardner's Tree Crab food I was using. Gardner's is the only food with mangrove sap in it, but it uses bone meal which can be adulterated with heavy metals.

When I found out you could put mangroves in salt or fresh water, and that they'd act as filters, and since they come from the crabs' native habitat and it stands to reason that they'd eat it a lot, I decided to get some.

Most of my first lot have had all the tops eaten off, but I have a second set in a mini-greenhouse I made, growing tall before I throw them to the crabs.

If one dies you can always grind it up in a food processor. My crabs loved the chips fresh and dried, too.

My husband is from the tropics, and he told me that even the ones the crabs "killed" might still be able to recover, and when I looked at the roots and saw that they were still alive and growing, I took several of the mangled ones out and put them in the greenhouse. They look like they're starting to grow again! So this is a great thing to have in the crab tank: native food, nutritious, and renewable with a little forethought and care.

The ones in the tank are growing very slowly because of the low light levels, but still growing. Baby mangroves come to rest in all sorts of places, and especially under larger trees, so they must be adapted to live in low light, as these seem to do. Currently, for summer, I have 15 watts of fluorescent above each water basin, and 40 watt incandescent on each side.

I've got the mini-greenhouse under a 400 watt metal halide light, and they're growing, putting out new leaves, and doing wonderfully.

Bloodymary, knowing a good thing when she hears it, has also ordered mangroves, as have a couple of other people I know. So I'm very interested in hearing what her crabs' reaction was, and if they look as cute poledancing at the top of the mangroves and mine did!

[BL00DYMARY]

OH, they are loving these.. I would take pictures but I have yet to catch them in action. The leaves are all missing from the trees I put in the fresh water foutain & I did catch sprinkles nibbling at the stem of one of the trees in the salt water pool yesterday. I put a bunch of them in my fishtank too, they look so cool in a little grouping. I may put a few more into the tank with the crabs, bury little pots with pebbles & water under the substrate like I did with the Bamboo.

[BL00DYMARY]

[moire_eel]

LOL! Very cute.

[Jennifer Leatherwood]

Great shot!!

[Kali_Ma]

LOL!!! Itchy pole dances on the mangroves too!



Those crazy compressus!