New Barebottom: Need a recommendation for a cleanup crew

[pwest]

Well, I went to bed at 2:30 last night after removing all my rock and putting it in the cooker, digging out my sandbed, cleaning out my 'fuge, etc, etc and woke up this morning to find a PM on my RC account inviting me to this great new group!! Thanks, SeanT

First, a few details on my setup. 150g Oceanic RR in-wall with a 35 g sump. Two Wave2k devices for flow. 2 blueline 800 return pumps. The skimmer is an MR2 with an Iwaki 55. I just added two of the large Seio 2600 gph flow pumps at the bottom. Lighting is a 72" aquaspacelight with 3x250W MH and 4x24w actinic.

Fish: Powder blue tang, royal gramma, small spotted mandarin, two small clowns, copper banded butterfly, one cleaner shrimp.

Why did I go barebottom? My reef has been up for almost three years. For the last year or so, I've had persistent problems with hair algae, and problems getting calc and alk where I want it. A few months ago I had a soft tank crash (failure to thrive?) where everything except my soft coral slowly died. My leathers, mushrooms, anchor, polyps, etc continued to do well.

Observations from the cleanout last night. Not much life in the substrate, but it neither looked bad nor smelled bad. Ditto for the sand in the fuge. I also have very few snails or crabs left. So:

Please provide a recommendation for type and quantity of critters in the cleanup crew. Any other comments about the process will be welcomed, too.

Thanks,
Phil

[REEF-DADDY]

Originally Posted by pwest

Please provide a recommendation for type and quantity of critters in the cleanup crew. Any other comments about the process will be welcomed, too.

Thanks,
Phil

I think you'll be very happy with your choice. I've found the cleanup crew you be a very important part of barebottom husbandry. I am using 1 small cerith per gallon, and about .5 astrea per gallon. Seems about right for me, but I also have a Chevron tang(bristletooth detrivour) that is always cleaning as well, so I am on the conservative side. Good luck.

[elephen]

Astreas and ceriths as SeanT would say...

In a 150 I would do 200 ceriths and 125-150 astreas.

[Weatherman]

If you have the misfortune of accidentally introducing red algae into your tank I’d highly recommend Mexican Turbos. You only need two or three for a 150g tank.

In my 120 (sps tank), my cleaners consist of:

60 Margarites - Pyramid snails killed off all my astreas
2 Mexican Turbos - keeps the fuzzy red algae under control
4 Peppermint Shrimp - aiptasia don’t stand a chance
1 Rock-borer Urchin - hitchhiker

1 Foxface and 1 Virgatus Rabbitfish - clean the tank of just about every other kind of macroalgae, including dictyota and pinnate reds


In my 180 (anemone tank), my cleaners consist of:

80 Astreas - don’t have problems with pyramid snails here
4 Mexican Turbos - keeps the fuzzy reds under control
2 Peppermint Shrimp - aiptasia killers
2 Skunk Cleaners - just for fun
3 Brittle Stars - whatever the anemones don’t catch, these guys will
2 Club Sea Urchins - hitchhikers
1 Rock-borer Urchin - hitchhiker
1 foot-long Bristle Worm - hitchhiker

1 Powder Blue Tang - nibbles on everything, including Xenia



In my 155 (soft coral tank), my cleaners consist of:

90 Astreas - good film algae eaters
3 Mexican Turbos - eat macroalgae the astreas don’t touch
1 Peppermint Shrimp - need to get one more
2 Skunk Cleaners - just for fun
2 Rock-borer Urchins - hitchhikers

1 Yellow Mimic Tang and 1 Coral Beauty Angel - nibble on everything

[SeanT]

Originally Posted by Weatherman

If you have the misfortune of accidentally introducing red algae into your tank I’d highly recommend Mexican Turbos. You only need two or three for a 150g tank.

Weatherman, are you taliking about that red "beard like" algae.
Very coarse stuff that doesn't grow long?
Sean

[Weatherman]

Originally Posted by SeanT

Weatherman, are you taliking about that red "beard like" algae.
Very coarse stuff that doesn't grow long?
Sean

These algae used to be my nemesis. Fuzzy red on the left. Pinnate red in the middle. Dictyota on the right.




A couple of Mexican Turbos and a Virgatus Rabbitfish now have it under control.

[gwaco]

i really think the amount should be dictated by how much algae you have . you say you are cooking the rock , so hopefully you will not have any algae when your done . i know jerel used to recommend a pretty high load of snails but i have found less to be more desirable. why add bio-load if you don't need it . if you look at weathermans list of snails he has what many would consider a light snail count , but he has fish that take up the slack ( i would much rather watch a fish swim in my tank than 200 snails crawling around ) . in my 75 i have maybe a dozen astreas , one turbo , and a tuxedo urchin ( for the coralline ) and that is it . so i guess you really are going to have too wait until you get things back up and running before you decide whether you need 20 snails or 200 snails !

[Weatherman]

Originally Posted by gwaco aka goat herder

if you look at weathermans list of snails he has what many would consider a light snail count , but he has fish that take up the slack ( i would much rather watch a fish swim in my tank than 200 snails crawling around ) .

And, I cannot say enough positive things about my little Virgatus rabbit.
Here’s an update to the picture, above:




Nearly all the red algae and dictyota are gone, having been nibbled away by the rabbit. I now just have a few valonia, which I can easily remove by hand.

BTW, that little, brown thing down on the cuttingboard is a baby pocillopora. I’ve got three or four dozen of those scattered around the tank.

[gwaco]

dang !

[pwest]

Based on the recommendations above, I ordered 200 Astreas and 200 Ceirths from http://www.keyscritters.com/. They came in great shape, except they sent me 50 extra snails (well, that's how the bags were labeled, I didn't actually count them...), no-charge, including 10 white ceriths!!

-Phil

[trueblackpercula]

wow thats a lot of snails

[Krux]

yep, keys is where i always get my cleanup. can't beat the serivice or the prices.

[trueblackpercula]

got a link?

[gman0526]

www.keyscritters.com

[trueblackpercula]

Thanks