Peppermint shimp in refugium

Keeping peppermint shrimp in a refugium was starting to be discussed on another thread, however, it appears that thread is dead and I would REALLY love to hear more about this if anybody can share.

What was discussed as benefits/challenges for keeping these shrimp and what I would love to hear specifically about is:

General Care-Do you need to feed them anything additional to what is already in the fuge?

Spawning-the benefit would be to help provide food for corals. How can you tell the difference between a male and female shrimp to make sure you have purchased a pair? Do you need to do anything to start spawning other than provide adequate food? How often will they spawn?

Compatibility-I have heard that Peps are faily mean. Are they mean within conspecifics or agressive to their mate if in a mated pair? Are they agressive with other fish/ small fish such as gobies? Do they nip on coral?

That last bit about compatibility pertains to deciding to keep them in the refuge or in the display tank. Any thoughts on +/- on either one would be great.

 

Hmmm this is a good post bump cuz im liking this idea

 

I also like the idea. I think it would be cool to have a pair of shrimp in the fuge that spawn regularly. I've had peppys before but never a pair of them.

I would think some additional feeding would be beneficial. I feed all my shrimps (1 blood red, 1 peppy, 2 sexies) a little piece of fresh seafood once a week or so.

I don't really see a downside to having them in your fuge. They might catch some pods every now and again but don't really think they would decimate the pod population. (Please correct me if I'm wrong guys/gals)

IME peppy's can be a little aggresive but I haven't seen any aggression from mine. I know CBS are more aggressive as they get on the larger size.

I don't really have any knowledge when it comes to their spawning behaviors but I'm gonna tag along on this one!

 

That's where I keep mine, in the fuge. Well, I had two and I couldn't find one of them but I am going to purchase another. I enjoy them in the fuge. Which I recently upgraded. I had them in my DT but as soon as I placed my Sebae Anemone in the DT both B-lined it toward it. I did not know their intentions so I just took them out as safe measure. They never nipped at any of my corals while in the DT though. Tagging along....

 

I have about 10 lbs of rock rubble in the fuge and my DT drains directly into it. A peppermint shrimp would be perfectly fine without any extra feeding in an area like that, but each fuge is different.

I purchased my peppermint shrimp mainly for aiptasia. He lives in the DT and is my aiptasia janitor, and has done an amazing job I might add.

Can't answer the other questions other than he's never had a problem with my gobies.

Shrimp meets aiptasia

 

The original post that got this thinking was by Dingo-would love to hear him/her chime in on this subject.

This was their original post from another refugium thread.

"Interestingly enough I don't see them killing the populations. Maybe initially but then things always bounce back. I keep 4 shrimp in my 20g fuge. I keep the chaeto ball dense and they can't get in there to get those pods.
Generally skunk cleaners give one batch every 2 weeks. Pepp shrimp on the other hand are way cheaper and like constantly carrying eggs so that's what I like about them. On the other hand pepps are usually meaner"

Sorry I didnt know how to officially carry the quote over without copy and pasting it.

What is overall experience with peps eating the pod populations? Would that be a serious deterent to keeping them in the fug?

 

I'm not sure how much of an effect they would have on the pod population. I would think that if you keep them well fed they might not hunt them down as much.

 

I keep mine there and my pod population seems to be doing fine. I put him there due to him taking a liking for LPS. Also, I do not feed him, except whatever food gets sucked into the overflow and he has survived for 3 months.