My Stomatopods (Mantis Shrimp)

Here are a few more of my videos, I recently learned how to make them HD 1080 quality so make sure to full screen it...









Hope you like them

LIKE

Today was an exciting day for me I went out and purchased most of the PVC needed to make many of the DIY tunnels that I plan on having setup just like my 1st one .

Stopped by my LFS and noticed that they had more 'elcheapo' Ric's for sale so I snapped up them as well =) they were quit cheap only $15 e.a. picked up 5, they also had lots more of that Turtle Grass in that I previously had in a tank with The Leviathan, although instead of them having 1 rock this time they had a dozen rocks some fist size, others 2 fist sized. I picked up 2, double fist sized rocks and decided that this time I would put them in a different tank.

The Results

Up first we got Rocky and his compartment, unwilling to purchase any ultra grade top quality Ric's yet (plan is to though) I decided to place all the Ric's I have (and could move) on the top Plateaus as planned (except instead of a cluster as there are currently, it will be 1 Ultra Grade Ric per plateau). You can see Rocky poking rite out of the top right entry/exit hole curiously looking around, doing the monkey "just hanging out"!


Rocky is a true Camera Thief, he can get in every shot and isn't afraid of anything, instead of fleeing, he just opens up more (appendages etc. too look bigger). Here he is sitting in the Top Left entry/exit hole along side the Ric's on the Plateau beside him.


Like I said...he is a Camera hog! He starts to creep out as he begins to see the 'evil giant eye' come slowly towards him and his precious treasure of Ric's


Finally here he is again...as I was getting a close up on this Ric that started to already open up, he charged out and gave me a warning, so I thought I would shift focus a bit to get them both (Ric & Rocky) in the pic .


Up next, Maximus & Minnie....

Like I said above I purchased some Turtle Grass today, the same as I had in the tank with The Leviathan a while back, however instead of putting in the place I had it previously I thought I would get 2 pieces and give both Maximus & Minnie a rock each to get lost within its fine long bright green hair. Only thing is....how to best position it so far I like how I have it with Minnie but I am still toying around with the position I have Maximus in, suffice to say, his won't stay the way it is in the pic.

Minnie



Maximus



Like I said I don't really like the way I have the side that Maximus resides on setup, I am likely to change it and when I am satisfied I will post pics of him again

More to come!!!

Didn't take me long to sit down be 'happy' and get back to be 'unhappy' a.k.a had to change something and as I stated, it was the compartment of Maximus however I am HAPPY to say that I finally got it to what I now like also in the process of it all I ended up creating a sort of "man cave" for him with it being 50:50 (rock:grass) but both parts meet together at the top (mostly thanks to the flow and turtle grass being so flexible) hence creating a cavity beneath and a sort of cave .

Here is Maximus checking it all out, have to be really careful with him, he was constantly going for my fingers, he strikes the rod that I use to manipulate things around but if he sees I get careless and have my fingers in the water at the top a bit, he shoots for the surface to get my fingers! Smart!!


Hard to see because of the camera flash but you can see a "shape" from the entry/exit to his rock to the hermit at the other side all is covered above by turtle grass and because it's hugging the side of the tank it covers the light above.


More to come!

The Leviathan Awakens!

HD1080p Quality



A tribute to my favorite stomatopod, The Leviathan a male Lysiosquillina maculata, hope you enjoy.

It's been a while...

Here is my latest video production, I have since acquired a better camera with High Speed (slow motion) capabilities....enjoy.



Hope you enjoy...

P.S. Liquidg If you see this, I'll be sending you a PM soon... .

wow you've got some great footage there mate!

That latest 4min video took over a month to create simply due to the difficulty of recording in High Speed...cameras available to average home users won't be able to actually record in High Speed for very long and the Higher the Speed (slower the motion) the recording time gets shorter and shorter, my camera records well at 400FPS (it's the best thing I could find for under $5k...) but the problem is it only records for 4seconds...things can often end in less then 1 second with a creature that strikes so fast, timing is everything, reading the animals movements pre-strike and learning to premeditate it's actions, I cannot simply set the camera up and walk away whilst it records (as I do in HD mode which can record for a good 30mins), I need to hit record on the camera rite before the strike...I have missed many grand captures that I'd of loved to of captured fully (usually left with the tail of the prey being dragged into the burrow).

Smasher are far easier to record in High Speed.

Picking up where I left off with Rocky and his DIY PVC burrow...(if you scroll up a few posts).

This DIY PVC burrow turned out...very poorly...

I made the four front entry/exit holes to the burrow, to close to the front window of the tank making it to difficult for him to access it and to make matters worse, the glue had started to peel off revealing the bare white PVC beneath making the whole thing look very ugly in the end...

HOWEVER...things quickly changed with a complete remake and design of a new DIY PVC burrow, firstly a finer substrate was used, then a better more liquid and water like glue, finally I decided to fill up half of the compartment with the structure rather then the compartment entirely, this way I could sit the DIY PVC burrow structure in the rear half up against the rear wall of the tank giving the stomatopod all the free foraging space out the front it needs to easily access and exit the burrow when needed...

this is the upgraded burrow ... 


The DIY PVC burrow has a total of 5 entry exit points same as the last one however they are mostly at various water levels (2 at substrate, 2 mid, 1 at the very top) allowing the Stomatopod optimal vantage points throughout the compartment.