Best Reef Safe CUC?

[gordoncheers]

what are some good cuc for algae on sand and glass

 

[ReincidentReefer]

what are some good cuc for algae on sand and glass

For algae I like to use hermit crabs (yellow legs and the smaller kind) and turbo snails, never had any problems regarding corals, etc.

 

[gordoncheers]

would these cuc deplete the sand of its microfauna?

 

[Gumbies R Us]

would these cuc deplete the sand of its microfauna?

CUC mainly eats algae, it is not going to disturb your microfauna.

 

[PotatoPig]

Also, Conches.

 

[muzikalmatt]

I would go for a mix of snails including astrea, trochus, cerith, and nassarius snails. Astrea and trochus snails will help clean the rockwork, glass and walls of the tank. Cerith and nassarius snails will help clean the sand bed. They are all reef safe and relatively affordable.

Hermit crabs will eat algae, but they have some downfalls including potentially eating snails and needing a constant supply of new shells to move into as they grow in size. They do have a lot of personality though. If you want hermit crabs, I'd recommend starting with the smaller blue-legged hermits as they are less aggressive than the red-legged ones.

 

[gordoncheers]

How many would you recommend for a 150 gallon?

I would go for a mix of snails including astrea, trochus, cerith, and nassarius snails. Astrea and trochus snails will help clean the rockwork, glass and walls of the tank. Cerith and nassarius snails will help clean the sand bed. They are all reef safe and relatively affordable.

Hermit crabs will eat algae, but they have some downfalls including potentially eating snails and needing a constant supply of new shells to move into as they grow in size. They do have a lot of personality though. If you want hermit crabs, I'd recommend starting with the smaller blue-legged hermits as they are less aggressive than the red-legged ones.

 

[TX_REEF]

Trochus snails, skunk cleaner shrimp, pithos crabs. I've never seen any of these harm corals.

 

[muzikalmatt]

How many would you recommend for a 150 gallon?

I'd recommend starting slowly. Old, conventional wisdom in the reefing hobby used to say add X number of snails per gallon of water, but that is terrible advice imo. What's more important is how much algae you have for the CUC to sustain themselves on and finding a balance. You want enough snails to keep the algae at bay, but not so many that they eventually start to starve due to lack of food.

Maybe start with 5 astrea snails, 5 trochus snails, 5 cerith snails, and 5 nassarius snails. Put them in the tank and see how they do for a while (maybe a week or two). Observe what parts of the tank the different species start cleaning and then make a decision on which ones you like and how many more you might need based on their progress. Again, don't go overboard in an effort to get the tank cleaner faster.