I think i'll soon be ready to get my clean-up crew.

jdrink · 08/10/2011, 02:29 AM

So, what should i get? >.< I have at least one aiptasia in the tank, so i was thinking at least one peppermint shrimp, maybe two. (Although my LFS doesn't seem to have any, and i can't seem to find an australian website that does either).

What are some good snails etc to get? I have a shallow sand bed, about 1 - 1.5", if that matters, and about 20lbs of live rock.

shaginwagon13 · 08/10/2011, 08:37 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jdrink

So, what should i get? >.< I have at least one aiptasia in the tank, so i was thinking at least one peppermint shrimp, maybe two. (Although my LFS doesn't seem to have any, and i can't seem to find an australian website that does either).

What are some good snails etc to get? I have a shallow sand bed, about 1 - 1.5", if that matters, and about 20lbs of live rock.

How many gallons is your tank? I wouldn't count strictly on the peppermint shrimp to eat the aiptasia because not all of them seem to eat them. I had 10 of them in my previous system and they didn;t touch the aiptasia. You could try a cobberband butterfly fish. They have been known to eat aiptasia but its hit and miss with those too cause not all of them do it. Best thing is to buy something that will get rid of them fast before they multiply

http://www.aquacave.com/aiptasia-x-6...dsea-2146.html

cloak · 08/10/2011, 12:13 PM

If you have any epoxy laying around you can smother aptasia with that. As far as the snails go, you might want to start off with a half a dozen or so at first and see how they do. Try to mix it up if you can. (turbo, trochus, astrea, nerite, cerith, nassarius)

PurpleMonkey · 08/10/2011, 03:15 PM

I love watching my tonga nassarius rise from the sand to feed! with 20lbs of rock I'm gonna guess that your tank is under 30g. For my 30, I started with 3 cerith, 1 trochus and 2 tonga nassarius (altho with your shallower sand bed, may the regular ones? or a fighting conch?). Start with fewer and work your way up.

As for the aiptasia, since you have nothing in the tank atm, why not just boil some water and use a syringe to flash kill the aiptasia? Use RO water and nuke the bastards!!!

PurpleMonkey · 08/10/2011, 03:17 PM

* dbl post *

jdrink · 08/10/2011, 03:49 PM

Yeah i think i'll just try some of that Aiptasia X, if the syringe method doesn't work. That was more or less my only reason for wanting to go with the peppermint shrimp.

And yeah my tank is about 24g.

jdrink · 08/10/2011, 03:59 PM

I was looking at some Turbo Snails on a website, and they seem cool. But i notice they say that they can possibly knock things over when they get bigger... What is the likelihood that they will knock over my rocks?

scarface70706 · 08/10/2011, 04:08 PM

in my last tank (55gal) i bought about 6 turbo snails. still wasnt enough. so i bought 2 star fish and two cleaner shrimp. still wasnt enough. lol um got about 6 hermits and that seamed to put the iceing on the cake for my clean up crew. def look into buying bigger empty shells about 12 so when the hermits get bigger they wont kill each other off for the shell.

PurpleMonkey · 08/10/2011, 04:18 PM

I looked into turbo snails for my 30 (well technically a 29g bc) but I decided against them for the moment because of their size and tendancy to bulldoze and knock things over.

I gotta say I'm happy of my ceriths and my trochus is doing a great job, I'm probably going to add one more trochus and a couple of nerites if my LFS brings them in (supposed to be in on their next Phillipines shipment)

Now, I do have 2 blue leg hermits (came in as hitchhikers). I've provided shells for them and they seem to leave my snails alone... at least for now. Crabs are a personal choice... depends if you are willing to risk a snail or two

PurpleMonkey · 08/10/2011, 04:21 PM

I looked into turbo snails for my 30 (well technically a 29g bc) but I decided against them for the moment because of their size and tendancy to bulldoze and knock things over.

I gotta say I'm happy of my ceriths and my trochus is doing a great job, I'm probably going to add one more trochus and a couple of nerites if my LFS brings them in (supposed to be in on their next Phillipines shipment)

Now, I do have 2 blue leg hermits (came in as hitchhikers). I've provided shells for them and they seem to leave my snails alone... at least for now. Crabs are a personal choice... depends if you are willing to risk a snail or two

jdrink · 08/10/2011, 07:02 PM

The only snails I can find on Australian sellers seem to be turbo and trochus. I might just get 3 or so trochus as a start and just add more as needed.

jdrink · 08/11/2011, 01:23 AM

Well, i tried the boiling water syringe method with the aiptasia, and seemingly i failed. It disappeared for a little bit, but now it's back and doesn't seem phased. Unless this is just it's corpse or something.

But my snails are in the tank now so i don't think it would be safe to try the boiling water thing again (right?). I'll have to get some of that aiptasia X. I watched a youtube video about it and it looks pretty easy to use. I'm just worried that the stuff might harm other things in the tank, although it claims not to.

Andrew17030 · 08/11/2011, 02:01 AM

IMO snails are snails they are not a "clean up crew" the are good for eating algae but they just release their crap back into the water. Right? Organics in the water still, dissolved but still there, right? You would be fine with one or two guessing that your tank is under 40 gallons US because you have 20lbs of live rock. If you don't have algae many find that snails slowly die because they starve. With one or two snails the algae that you have, Im guessing only, will disappear slowly and their waste will be consumed by your bacterial population slowly. The trend will be towards shifting the bio load of your tank onto the bacterial population. If the algae are tanking up most of the nutrients then bacteria have a harder time establishing themselves. Let them establish themselves and then evaluate how you will manage the access nutrients that they cannot consume. You can increase the population of bacteria that your system can support by giving them more homes. Bacteria live on things, more than in the water column. Live rock is an excellent home for bacteria as well as smaller sized sand. There is a range that experts have determined will support the majority of bacteria. There is a range because they do not all like the same sized particles. If you look around on the internet for the range you will find it easily. Google search deep sand beds, you don't have to want to utilize a DSB for the article to be informative. I personally would pull the rock to an area where you can work on it and use a syringe to feed the aiptasia Kalkwasser paste. This will be hard for them to live through. If it lives repeat it until it is gone. I would not buy an animal just for removing one or even ten aiptasia in a small tank. The copperband will probably die, they are not easy fish to keep, and the peppermint shrimp may not even look at the aiptasia. You could buy ten peppermint shrimp before you get one that wants to eat your aptasia. Then they will all be gone in a matter of days. Good luck.

tylernt · 08/11/2011, 09:08 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jdrink

Well, i tried the boiling water syringe method with the aiptasia, and seemingly i failed.

Ah yes, the bane of reefers everywhere.

I was able to eliminate several aiptasias in my tank recently with pure sodium hydroxide, or caustic lye. You can buy it pure because people make homemade soap with it. I hear Draino also works too but it has other additives.

The stuff is powerful, so I mix up a separate container of disposable SW where I apply it to LR taken from the main tank. I mix up a strong concentration with a little RO/DI and I don't even have to inject it in to the aiptasia -- just blast a glob on it and let it cook (mixing lye and water is exothermic, so it really does cook!) for a few seconds. The excess lye can be shaken off and it falls to the bottom of your container like cloudy Jell-o.

It does cause some collateral damage -- all coralline on the LR that is touched by the lye, even briefly, bleaches within minutes of being placed back in the tank. But each aiptasia becomes a cloudy blob and I watched bristleworms eat all the blobs as soon as the lights went out. My Cerith snail even munched on one dead aiptasia. The Cerith is still alive so I guess the lye was gone/harmless by then!

In the past I injected lemon juice and Kalk but if I didn't get it inside the aiptasia, it didn't work very well. I'm now a convert to lye.

08/10/2011, 02:29 AM	#1
jdrink Registered Member Join Date: Jul 2011 Location: NSW, Australia Posts: 53	I think i'll soon be ready to get my clean-up crew. So, what should i get? >.< I have at least one aiptasia in the tank, so i was thinking at least one peppermint shrimp, maybe two. (Although my LFS doesn't seem to have any, and i can't seem to find an australian website that does either). What are some good snails etc to get? I have a shallow sand bed, about 1 - 1.5", if that matters, and about 20lbs of live rock.

08/10/2011, 12:13 PM	#3
cloak Moved On Join Date: Jul 2000 Location: Stockton, CA Posts: 14,854	If you have any epoxy laying around you can smother aptasia with that. As far as the snails go, you might want to start off with a half a dozen or so at first and see how they do. Try to mix it up if you can. (turbo, trochus, astrea, nerite, cerith, nassarius) Last edited by cloak; 08/10/2011 at 12:19 PM.

08/10/2011, 03:17 PM	#5
PurpleMonkey Registered Member Join Date: May 2011 Posts: 78	* dbl post * Last edited by PurpleMonkey; 08/10/2011 at 04:16 PM.

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08/10/2011, 03:15 PM	#4
PurpleMonkey Registered Member Join Date: May 2011 Posts: 78	I love watching my tonga nassarius rise from the sand to feed! with 20lbs of rock I'm gonna guess that your tank is under 30g. For my 30, I started with 3 cerith, 1 trochus and 2 tonga nassarius (altho with your shallower sand bed, may the regular ones? or a fighting conch?). Start with fewer and work your way up. As for the aiptasia, since you have nothing in the tank atm, why not just boil some water and use a syringe to flash kill the aiptasia? Use RO water and nuke the bastards!!!

08/10/2011, 03:49 PM	#6
jdrink Registered Member Join Date: Jul 2011 Location: NSW, Australia Posts: 53	Yeah i think i'll just try some of that Aiptasia X, if the syringe method doesn't work. That was more or less my only reason for wanting to go with the peppermint shrimp. And yeah my tank is about 24g.

08/10/2011, 03:59 PM	#7
jdrink Registered Member Join Date: Jul 2011 Location: NSW, Australia Posts: 53	I was looking at some Turbo Snails on a website, and they seem cool. But i notice they say that they can possibly knock things over when they get bigger... What is the likelihood that they will knock over my rocks?

08/10/2011, 04:08 PM	#8
scarface70706 Registered Member Join Date: Jul 2011 Posts: 1,364	in my last tank (55gal) i bought about 6 turbo snails. still wasnt enough. so i bought 2 star fish and two cleaner shrimp. still wasnt enough. lol um got about 6 hermits and that seamed to put the iceing on the cake for my clean up crew. def look into buying bigger empty shells about 12 so when the hermits get bigger they wont kill each other off for the shell.

08/10/2011, 04:18 PM	#9
PurpleMonkey Registered Member Join Date: May 2011 Posts: 78	I looked into turbo snails for my 30 (well technically a 29g bc) but I decided against them for the moment because of their size and tendancy to bulldoze and knock things over. I gotta say I'm happy of my ceriths and my trochus is doing a great job, I'm probably going to add one more trochus and a couple of nerites if my LFS brings them in (supposed to be in on their next Phillipines shipment) Now, I do have 2 blue leg hermits (came in as hitchhikers). I've provided shells for them and they seem to leave my snails alone... at least for now. Crabs are a personal choice... depends if you are willing to risk a snail or two

08/10/2011, 04:21 PM	#10
PurpleMonkey Registered Member Join Date: May 2011 Posts: 78	I looked into turbo snails for my 30 (well technically a 29g bc) but I decided against them for the moment because of their size and tendancy to bulldoze and knock things over. I gotta say I'm happy of my ceriths and my trochus is doing a great job, I'm probably going to add one more trochus and a couple of nerites if my LFS brings them in (supposed to be in on their next Phillipines shipment) Now, I do have 2 blue leg hermits (came in as hitchhikers). I've provided shells for them and they seem to leave my snails alone... at least for now. Crabs are a personal choice... depends if you are willing to risk a snail or two

08/10/2011, 07:02 PM	#11
jdrink Registered Member Join Date: Jul 2011 Location: NSW, Australia Posts: 53	The only snails I can find on Australian sellers seem to be turbo and trochus. I might just get 3 or so trochus as a start and just add more as needed.

08/11/2011, 01:23 AM	#12
jdrink Registered Member Join Date: Jul 2011 Location: NSW, Australia Posts: 53	Well, i tried the boiling water syringe method with the aiptasia, and seemingly i failed. It disappeared for a little bit, but now it's back and doesn't seem phased. Unless this is just it's corpse or something. But my snails are in the tank now so i don't think it would be safe to try the boiling water thing again (right?). I'll have to get some of that aiptasia X. I watched a youtube video about it and it looks pretty easy to use. I'm just worried that the stuff might harm other things in the tank, although it claims not to.

08/11/2011, 02:01 AM	#13
Andrew17030 Moved On Join Date: May 2009 Location: Phoenix Arizona Posts: 607	IMO snails are snails they are not a "clean up crew" the are good for eating algae but they just release their crap back into the water. Right? Organics in the water still, dissolved but still there, right? You would be fine with one or two guessing that your tank is under 40 gallons US because you have 20lbs of live rock. If you don't have algae many find that snails slowly die because they starve. With one or two snails the algae that you have, Im guessing only, will disappear slowly and their waste will be consumed by your bacterial population slowly. The trend will be towards shifting the bio load of your tank onto the bacterial population. If the algae are tanking up most of the nutrients then bacteria have a harder time establishing themselves. Let them establish themselves and then evaluate how you will manage the access nutrients that they cannot consume. You can increase the population of bacteria that your system can support by giving them more homes. Bacteria live on things, more than in the water column. Live rock is an excellent home for bacteria as well as smaller sized sand. There is a range that experts have determined will support the majority of bacteria. There is a range because they do not all like the same sized particles. If you look around on the internet for the range you will find it easily. Google search deep sand beds, you don't have to want to utilize a DSB for the article to be informative. I personally would pull the rock to an area where you can work on it and use a syringe to feed the aiptasia Kalkwasser paste. This will be hard for them to live through. If it lives repeat it until it is gone. I would not buy an animal just for removing one or even ten aiptasia in a small tank. The copperband will probably die, they are not easy fish to keep, and the peppermint shrimp may not even look at the aiptasia. You could buy ten peppermint shrimp before you get one that wants to eat your aptasia. Then they will all be gone in a matter of days. Good luck.