are urchins reef safe?

[blueshape]

I was adding water to my sump when lo and behold there was what looks to be a baby puple urchin grazing on some hair algea.
What should I do with it? Should I put in my main tank?

[Louie3]

I've only had bad expericence with urchines you can keep it but as long as it doesnt die, it will realese an orange stinky goo, this will mess with all your parmeters, they will knock down corals though

[reefnewbie54321]

I would say no,

- Knock over everything
- Clean your rocks of all coralline
- Dont last long unless you have an ongoing algae problem
- Will put bite marks and take shavings out of an acyrilic tank
- Will eat the silicone seams of a glass tank

Unluss your trying to have a quick fix for a serious Hair Algae break out then dont add him and even then remove him after the outbreak is over or he will starve and start eating "other" stuff that I listed.

[dalbrecht]

I personally like having my urchin in my reef.

Yes they eat coraline, yes they are strong enough to cause avalanches. But... they eat nuisance algae extremely well and are an interesting addition to the tank.

I have to supplement feed mine now because it is so effective.

[DrChaos619]

I have two longspines in my 90 gal reef and they seem to not bother anything aside from the slight algae on the back of my tank. they are roughly 6 inches long. they are a pleasure to watch, and all my friends are constantly humored that it defficates out of what everyone thought was its eye lol

....first post! hello everyone!

[racrumrine]

I have a tuxedo urchin in one tank and a long spine in another tank. I got both of them as freebies when I was buying other stuff from people getting out of the hobby.

They are really neat creatures and very interesting to watch. They eat nuisance algae better than any snail.

If you don't mind them eating coralline algae (100% solid purple rocks are not natural anyways), or knocking things over that are not solidly attached, then they are fine.

Since yours is in the sump, it won't hurt anything. You can transfer rocks with algae down to the sump for it to feed on.

Best of luck,

Roy

[AngeloM3]

Royal Urchins i would say are reef safe

i've had mine for about 3 months....hasnt eatten any corals, hasnt knocked over anything... will actually eat around my leather coral

very good at eatting algae!

[CrystalAZ]

Depends on the urchin - some are good and some aren't. There is a good article in one of the old Reefkeeping issues about different types.

I have 5 urchins and I love love love them. They eat algae, are fun to watch, and are cool looking.

Crystal

[Krazy]

I've got a pin cushion urchin.... Yeah it eats some coraline, but mainly off of my power heads, a little off the live rock but it grows back quick enough...

He's pretty cool looking !

[Sk8r]

They're a lot easier to catch than a rabbitfish.

[ACBlinky]

Originally posted by reefnewbie54321
I would say no,

- Knock over everything
- Clean your rocks of all coralline
- Dont last long unless you have an ongoing algae problem
- Will put bite marks and take shavings out of an acyrilic tank
- Will eat the silicone seams of a glass tank

I have a pincushion in my 65g, he's very well behaved.
- He doesn't knock anything over or otherwise bother the corals (it's essentially a FOWLR but I did add some Xenia and GSP)
- He doesn't remove all the coralline, far from it
- I've had him for quite a while; if he runs out of algae, I feed him seaweed sheets
- He certainly doesn't eat the silicone, I'm sure this is a myth or no one would keep urchins.

[Ryanqk]

I have a small purple one, they are cute and i like having ONE but he is a clumsy lil bugger and always is knocking things over and gorges on algae to the point i have a hard time getting it to grow, i would really only keep one in a big tank with lots of space and algae, and little stuff to knock over, kinda like having a hungry blind dog in a house with food and glass vases everywhere!