[pthornton]

Afternoon all ... in need of a little help, guidance and maybe a spear gun! Our 75 gallon tank just finished cycling and we put a few snails, hermit crabs, an emerald crab and a sally lighfoot to help eat some of the algae (about a week ago). Anyway, the time has come to add the first livestock and so we have added 2 orange spotted gobies, a lawnmower blenny, a coral banded shrimp, 2 camel back shrimp and a cleaner shrimp. After all was acclimated, we put them in the tank and within seconds, the sally ripped the first camel apart, tore the front claws off the coral banded and about 5 minutes later, killed the cleaner shrimp and is harrassing the emerald crab!!!

It was my understanding that these were non agressive algae eaters. Have I missed something?

Any help or comments would be appreciated ... I wonder if I should remove the crab, but it is impossible to catch.

[glampka]

The main word here is "generally". Generally they are considered reef safe. If the crab didn't have enough to eat it is possible it will attack others in the tank. Emeralds will do the same thing.
It's a proven killer - take it back.

[pthornton]

It has been fed to the gills ... invert food, plenty of algae, and some squid (the leftovers from the starfish feedings). This is the first I have heard they had the potential to be aggressive. Any ideas on how to get it out? It's lightning fast and I would hate to remove rock work.

[glampka]

Normally with a situation like that you would starve it for a few days, & then set a trap by putting some food in a jar or glass, wait for him to crawl in & then snatch the jar. You can also buy traps.

Good luck!

[e_baer]

im not sure if this would work, but you can try to catch it with some fishing line and a piece of chicken.

tie the line around hte small piece of chicken and then wait for the crab to grasp it, then slowly, and i mean it....SLOWLY raise the line and catch the crab with a net.