Always wanted a zebra moray for my reef tank and today came across a very small one, 7-8ich, and couldn’t pass it up. Everything should be fine with it in my tank and I’ve done plenty of research on them but one thing that never crossed my mind was if they would take a bite out of or eat tridacna clams. At the moment I have a 2-3 inch blue maxima, a medium squamosa and a medium derasa that I’d hate to lose. Also looking at getting a nice blue squamosa clam sometime in the future too and that’d be some expensive eel food if they do. Any thoughts or experiences that might help shed some light?
Zebra moray eel and tridacna clams
- Thread starter KMHREEFER
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Not to going munch on them, just make sure their placement in the tank is not in his pathway. The downside of these eels in a reef is that can be pretty rough on your corals, or clams. He'll generally keep to the rocks.
For now, with his extremely small size, shouldn’t be an issue, but if it becomes one I have a FOWLR tank I can move him too. Unless they are quick growers, hopefully I won’t have to worry about it for a while.
mtfish
Well-Known Member
That is so cool you found one that small. I have never seen one offered under 14 - 15 inches. How big of a tank do you have it in? Lots of rock work? I feed mine whole frozen shrimp. One of my favorite fish in the tank. I feed mine once or twice a week. They are not fast growers. Not great eyesight but can smell food a mile away.
I’ve never seen one that small before but they got it to eat about a quarter of a piece of krill at the store and it was roaming the tank so I couldn’t pass up the opportunity. I have a 75 gallon mixed reef at the moment and plan to upgrade in the next year or so to hopefully a 200-300 gallon. Plenty of rock work for him, actually only saw him once since he’s been in and that was this morning for only a minute and he was gone again. I’m keeping my fingers crossed hoping he makes it, the small size is the only thing that worries me. Can’t feed him if I can’t find him.
It is very rare to find a zebra eel that small. That is cool.
The pebbletoothed eels are very docile. I had one that allowed cleaner shrimp into it's mouth all the time. Whole shrimp are better than tails only. Mine also liked octopus, squid and cuttlefish.
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2002-12/fm/index.php
Edit: the whole "Fish Tales" series with Marini and Schultz III is excellent reading if people still do that nowadays.
The pebbletoothed eels are very docile. I had one that allowed cleaner shrimp into it's mouth all the time. Whole shrimp are better than tails only. Mine also liked octopus, squid and cuttlefish.
http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2002-12/fm/index.php
Edit: the whole "Fish Tales" series with Marini and Schultz III is excellent reading if people still do that nowadays.
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From what I’ve seen, I agree, that’s the only time I’ve seen one even close to that size. I cut a few krill up this morning and let the pieces flow behind my rock work hoping he finds them. If not my clean up crew will make short work of them.
Thank you, been a long process and a lot of trial and error. Recently removed many of my leathers to swap out with more sps frags, so given some time, hoping for a little more added color. Had to leave my yellow Fiji leather though, when it’s fully expanded it really adds to the tank. Always shrivels up after water changes for a day though.
I actually have quite a few of those left over from training my fu manchu lionfish to eat thawed frozen krill so may do that. Have had them in a small freshwater tank and have just been in there the last few months.
Maybe I’m being paranoid but haven’t seen the eel since early Sunday morning. Have a lot of hiding places but never had something that I couldn’t find in there with some patient searching and I’ve got a homemade mesh screen lid fit to not leave and openings or gaps and also added some extra mesh to the overflow just in case. Hoping it’s still just getting used to the tank and the fish in it. Suppose it could have burrowed into the sand under a rock somewhere though. Broadcast fed some large mysis and some small chunks of krill into the back of the tank hoping it’d smell it and come out to eat but so far no luck.
Zebras can go on LONG hunger strikes and periods where they will not eat... I am talking like months. You usually will see them from time to time during these periods. I would not sweat anything just yet.
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