---
title: Coral Snapping Shrimp (Alpheus lottini)
scientific_name: Alpheus lottini
common_name: Coral Snapping Shrimp
taxon: Shrimps
published: 2023-12-24T20:48:02.199Z
updated: 2026-08-16T07:58:27.397Z
tags: Coral Snapping Shrimp, Alpheus lottini, Shrimps, Red Sea, Marine Life, Diving
url: https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/invertebrate/crustaceans/shrimps/coral-snapping-shrimp
---

# Coral Snapping Shrimp (*Alpheus lottini*)

## Quick facts

- **Group:** Shrimps (*Caridea*)
- **Size:** 2.7 cm
- **Depth:** 1-60 m
- **Max age:** 10 yrs
- **Diet:** Omnivore
- **Activity:** Nocturnal
- **Rarity:** Common
- **Habitat:** Inside branching Pocillopora heads, one pair per colony
- **Reproduction:** Brooder

## How to recognise it

- lives deep inside branching Pocillopora, in a male and female pair
- translucent body under reddish-brown mottling
- one claw enlarged into a snapping claw, the other small
- a coral head with shrimp in it clicks continuously
- up to 2.7 cm

Look into a living Pocillopora head and you will usually find them: one male and one female snapping shrimp, and alongside them a pair of small crabs. They are not lodgers. They are the reason the coral is still standing.

When a crown-of-thorns starfish climbs onto a coral that has its guards, the crabs go for its tube feet and spines while the shrimp snaps at it, and the starfish gives up and moves to an easier colony. Work on Pacific reefs during outbreaks found guarded Pocillopora colonies surviving while unguarded ones a meter away were stripped to bare skeleton. The shrimp gets shelter and a share of the coral's mucus; the coral gets a standing army of four.

The pair holds one colony and defends it against other shrimp of its own kind as fiercely as against the starfish. They can live ten years in there, which for an animal under three centimeters long is a remarkable run, and it is the same coral for most of it.

## Also known as

- **English:** coral snapping shrimp, Lottin's Snapping Shrimp
- **French:** Crevette pistolet de Lottin
- **Spanish:** Camarón Pistola de Coral, Camarón pistola del coral, Camaron chasqueador
- **Japanese:** サンゴテッポウエビ
- **Chinese:** 珊瑚鼓蝦
- **Russian:** Синепятнистый щелкун

## Scientific synonyms

- *Alpheus laevis* Randall, 1840
- *Alpheus rouxii* Guérin-Méneville, 1857
- *Alpheus sublucanus* (Forsskål, 1775)
- *Alpheus thetis* White, 1847
- *Alpheus ventrosus* H. Milne Edwards, 1837
- *Cancer sublucanus* Forskål, 1775
- *Crangon latipes* Banner, 1953

## Range

Indian Ocean, Madagascar, Mozambique, Mozambique Channel, New Caledonian Exclusive Economic Zone, Red Sea, Seychelles, South Pacific Ocean

---

*Source: [Red Sea Creatures](https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/invertebrate/crustaceans/shrimps/coral-snapping-shrimp)*
*Updated: August 16, 2026*