Anyone got crabs?

[CTU2fan]

When I was younger there were some crabs that the LFS called "Bangkok crabs". They came in a dark red color, almost purple on the claws and legs, and a light golden yellow color (kind of the color of a gold severum). We had one of the orange ones for a few years in a tank with some medium-tempered cichlids and it did fine. It didn't seem to want/need a land area and it picked up things from the bottom to eat like a crayfish would. No problems other than it escaping from time to time, but eventually I had a mishap with the heater, the tank got up to around 95 and the crab died. Not sure if these are still around anywhere but they would probably work with the senegal, it was pretty big. The only ones I see lately are the fiddlers and moon crabs which both seem to need/want land to climb out on.

 

[cartisdm]

Ok crabs are now out of the question after bringing up the idea to my girlfriend (scary dream she had one time and now she hates them. Long story....don't ask lol). How about crayfish (or crawfish whatever they're called). Any chance I could get one of those to get along fine in my tank? Sorry I haven't really done any research on them yet I just thought I'd ask ya'll for your opinions.

 

[CTU2fan]

Crayfish will be easier to find for sure, and water quality wise they'll work better as they don't have the brackish requirements that many of the crabs do. Problem will be finding a crayfish that is big enough to avoid being eaten by the poly but also not so big that he decides to try catching and eating the poly himself. Might want to ask in the poly forum if crayfish are something they'd try eating, with some fish something that's too big to swallow will be ignored while others would see even a big crayfish as a meal, and try ripping legs/claws off...or definitely trying to eat it after a shed.