NANFA-L-- Crayfish Loosing Legs

Rose, Patrick PO (PWRose-in-C2Cen.uscg.mil)
Mon, 31 Jan 2005 08:06:51 -0500

I have 5 crayfish living in a 50 gal tank, 2 of the 5 are full grown and the
other 3 vary in size from 1.5 inches to 2 inches. The smallest one was the
first to loose all of his legs, although legless he/she seems to be living
and eating fine, just difficult for him to get around. He has been without
his legs for about a month now. The second one to do this was one of the mid
sized ones. He too seems to be do ok considering he has no legs. Now I
started thinking that maybe the larger ones were attacking the smaller ones
and that was how they were loosing their legs, but then this happened. The
larger of the two adults started loosing its legs, first it was a claw leg,
then one of the smaller back legs. I don't know what would be causing this
now. There is fish in the tank but none big enough to even mess with the
smallest of the crayfish. Most of the fish are just top minnows anyways, but
there is one sunfish in the tank as well. The sunfish is only-in-best an
inch long, proly closer to 3/4 inch long.

So has anyone seen or heard of this happening before, and if so how do I fix
it. They might be living and surviving, but I don't want them suffering
while doing so.

Oh yeah food wise, I feed the crayfish sinking shrimp pellets, and sometimes
give them small pieces of frozen fish (from the grocery store). The fish get
just plain ol flake food, and it varies in brand. (Well how would you feel
if you ate chicken done the same way every night, lol.)

The bottom of the tank has nothing but small rocks in it, so I had to add
hiding places for them during the day. Mostly hollow aquarium logs and other
store bought items. They don't seem to have to much trouble hiding during
the day, they just cant burrow down in the rocks that easily.

Any ideas and or suggestions as to what is going on with them and how to fix
it.
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