Did my Maxi Mini kill my Peppermint Shrimp?

I bought 3 Peppermint Shrimp just over a week ago. They got rid of my Aiptasia Anemone, which is why I bought them. I've been feeding them a little bit of flake food every day, and they all seemed to be acting normal. This morning I woke up to one of them dead on my Maxi Mini.



Sorry for the quality. I used my iPod camera.

The other Peppermints have started eating the dead shrimp. I just did a 5 galloon water change, just in case. Should I remove the dead shrimp?

Do you think that it is the culprit? Also, will it eat my other Peppermints and my CuC?

 

Ive had my maxi nem kill and try to eat a salfin tang so a pep shrimp would be no problem. They are extremely sticky so if it tried walking on it it could get stuck.

 

That would be my first guess, just 2 sea creatures doing what they do best:

Peppermint shrimp prey on smaller or short-tentacle nems, and the Maxi-Mini kills and at least attempts to eat anything that gets too close and careless.

Sorry for your loss.

And yes, if the other 2 follow suit, they'll most likely meet the same fate.

 

Thanks for the replies. What do you think I should do? Try and return the Peppermints back to the store or something? I'm not sure if they will take them, though :-/

 

That would be the easiest solution if they'll take them. Otherwise, you could feed them a small chunk of fish, shrimp, clam, etc once per week. That may keep them away from the nem.

 

Well I already feed them a bit of flake food every day. I'll ask my LFS if they'll take them back.

I was going to add an Anemone Crab, but I'm scared the Nems will kill it too :-/

 

Commensal crabs and shrimp should be fine; similar to a clownfish, they can reside in the nem's tentacles unharmed.

 

+1

yeah. some shrimp can form a symbiotic relationship with diff anenomes.

Or some shrimp host anenomes haha vinny

 

Usually peppermint shrimp kill maxi minis

 

Oh, I see. Thanks

Really? I didn't know that. How come this one died, though?