snails/cleaner crew

Melonbob

Melonbob

Reef enthusiast
I have been doing well with my tank and making excellent progress (IMO). But for those of you who have been keeping up, I got this diatom explosion. I have 6 snails and 3 hermits(which I never see). The snails are doing a kick ass job, the LR is bare wherever they hang out, but I can't see that many getting the job done. I need to expand my workforce. But how many should I have total? I mean what is a typical estimate for a 46g tank? How many can I add and how often? I just put two clowns in there on Monday as well, so I don't want to be adding more than I should in a short timeframe
 
The answers to that question can vary wildly, there are some people that say one snail per gallon! I would say another 6 or so for now, and I wouldn't count on them to rid you of the diatoms. Those will just have to run their course.
 
You want just enough to keep your tank clean.Its hard to put a number to it,because every tank is different.
 
Wow, you guys are fast! I was thinking of another 6, they aren't small. But can I add them all at once, or a bit at a time, since I just added clowns too. I don't want to go to fast.

Also I want to add two blood(fire) shrimp sometime in the near future, should I take this into consideration when picking up snails? I was told to wait a bit on the shrimp cause they can be fussy with water quality
 
You can add the snails all at once. They don't count towards your bioload like fish do. I would wait a couple months before adding shrimp. They require really stable water parameters.
 
I think I still have about 14--16 snails in my 30g tank. I HAD 19 at one point. I can't seam to count them all now. Don't know if they died--got eaten by hermits, or maybe they are hanging out on rocks and I simply can't see them all.

In a 46g tank, I'd probably go with 15-20. Biff is right about adding them all at once. Snails and other members of the cleaner crew, like hermits, do not count against you in the grand scheme of stocking the tank. They put out very little waste and DO eat waste products from the fish and leftover food.

Acclimate your snails VERY SLOWLY. Like 3hrs minimum. 5-6hrs is better. They are EXTREMELY sensitive changes in water chemistry--salinity, pH, etc... Simply acclimating them for 20 minutes and then chucking them in the tank would be like your body trying to surface rapidly after a 2hr dive at 100 feet below the surface. Ya might not die immediately--but the chances are pretty good it will do significant damage to your physiology.

I'd probably start out with about 10 hermits in the 46g tank. Try and find small or medium sized hermits if you can. But--do yourself a favor and buy some empty shells. I have about 20-30 empty shells in my tank. I'm HOPING it will prevent them from attacking each other AND my snails to steal the shells.

Just a guesstimate though. There really are no hard rules on the size of your cleaner crew. As the others already said--just depends on how much waste you have in the tank.

The brown algae bloom will go away on it's own. There's not much you can do about it. It takes between 2--4 weeks to go away. It's just a natural process that happens in a new tank. My snails didn't seam to put a dent in it. I think it just needs to run it's course.

Are you using RO/DI water? Tap water can lead to LOTS of algae problems.
 
The snails seem to be doing a good job on the brown algae, everywhere they've been is picked spotless. However, the stuff is everywhere so I can't see them acutally cleaning it out, it will likely go away on its own before that happens. Looks worst on the sand, really ugly stuff......lol
 
you can put in one sand star that will keep the sand mixed up around the tank. I like to put them in all my tanks.

-Doc
 
may be the wrong place to post this, but.. for a 100 gallon system the packages I have looked at have wild amounts of critters...is this about right for a 100 gallon?
100 - Blue Legged Hermits
15 - Red Scarlet Hermit
30 - Astrea Snails
30 - Margarita Snails
30 - Cerith Snails
I am thinking I may be ordering a clean up crew and maybe 2 clowns, unless I am advised against it, this is of course as soon as the nitrites and nitrates level out some.​
 
If you can, get a crab-less cleaner crew. The crabs will just end up killing your snails. I do think that package is way too large for a 100 gallon tank. Some places will try to sell you one snail per gallon, but then most of them end up starving to death. Maybe try to get a cleaner crew package about half that size to start. Then you can always add more if you need to.
 
Unfortunatly, that will not work for those of us in Canada, unless of course you know of a source that ships livestock to Canada. I think I could pick and choose what I want, as indivduals, and that really is not a problem, maybe a little more expensive but why cheap out now LOL. Mostly I am curious as to the quanities mentioned. Also would it be ok to add the cleaning crew and the clowns on the same day? Everything I get has to be shipped via airline, so I am hoping that I can purchse a couple fishes each order, I know slow is the way to go, just wondering if a couple fish a month until I am stocked would be over doing it.

Man I gotta stop doing that...just noticed your first post above biff....disregard the cleaner crew questions in this post LOL sorry

So 15 Nassarius, 30 margarita and 30 astrea should have me well covered to start with?
 
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Build your own and skip the margaritas.According to Biff,they are a cold water snail and will eventually boil to death.How about 20 trochus instead of those and a couple of mexican turbos if you have hair algae.

Two fish a month sounds good.Heck,I wish I was that patient.
 
Yeah, you can add fish and your cleaner crew at the same time. The cleaner crew doesn't count against your bioload like fish do.

Skip the margarita snails. They do not do well in reef tanks, since they are coldwater species collected off the coast of the Pacific Northwest, usually. They tend to slowly cook to death in reef tanks and rarely last longer than a couple weeks. Go with nassarius, astraea, trochus, turbos and cerith.
 
You type to much Biff.

Putter,get a couple of fighting or queen conchs too.They are great algae grazer and helps keep the top of the sand clean(sort of).
 
don't forget emerald crabs, a few of those for algae consumption. avoid hermit crabs. I like mexican turbos as well - just four or so

-Doc
 
Thanks for the help folks, will put together a list and make the order as soon as I get some zeros on my test results, happen to move a power head tonight....man what a mess, there is alot of crud on those rocks, will add a couple more power heads and get it stired up some see if I can get it filtered out.
 

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