what’s the most reef safe shrimp

[Tankkeepers]

Ya candy cane pistols are *****s but fun to watch and a words of warning dont freak out when the skunk cleaner jumps on your hand when your in the tank cleaning etc its just wanting to eat the dead skin off you mine does it everytime I put my hand in the tank even gives me a manicure kinda feels weird but does not actually hurt not all will do that but 2 out of the 5 iv had over the years have done it the one I have now is alittle clean happy as in I hovet over the tank and he tryes to clean me also as a cool trick you can hand feed them your family and friends will be like wow

 

[Tired]

Candycane pistols are entirely reef safe, aside from moving sand and possibly stealing little bitty frags. They won't bother corals or anything in any other way. Same for tiger pistols, though they can steal entire frag plugs, and are thus a bigger potential problem.

If a cleaner shrimp doesn't clean your hands, and you would like it to, they can easily be trained that they can come to your hand for food.

 

[Tankkeepers]

Good info on tiger pistols never had one of those just candy canes and yep mine have never went after corals ever and stay small enoff the the gun action does not even hurt the firefish when it ventures into its cave just makes it swim out really fast its amazing how the things we keep react to us as in my fish shrimp etc know who I am and all come out begging for food vs everyone else then run and hide from

 

[shim]

Agree if you have a flame hawk- They will eat every shrimp in sight

I thought "larger" shrimp were ok? Not the case?

 

[Tired]

It depends on how large the shrimp is compared to the hawk. They can eat a surprisingly large shrimp compared to their body size. So, as a general rule, shrimp don't go with flame hawks. Lobsters might work.

 

[Raphael Dalmeida]

I've been looking on getting some bigger prettier shrimp though wary of them becoming pest to my corals.

So far i have a heap of red handed shrimps - Palaemon serenus.
They are not the prettiest, but are very small shrimp, most are 3cm max. They are also known as rock pool shrimp.

I collected some near a beach here and they are great clean up crew and don't bother any inhabitants, and never steal food from corals.

 

[Fishfreak2009]

My previous sexy shrimp ate zoas and pocillopora. Safest and least stressful to the corals in my tanks were Ancyclomenes pedersoni and Urocaridella antonbruunii. Completely reef safe, work as cleaners, and small, peaceful, not overly pushy at feeding time. Urocaridella prefer to be kept in groups, Ancyclomenes prefer to live in an anemone.

 

[Spare time]

People love to say my "X" ate my coral when there are so many more plausible explanations.