Best snails and shrimp for a new tank?

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Cleaner shrimp and peppermints are common. Peppermints are more the scavenger that lives in the crevices while the cleaner is usually out and about at their cleaning station. Coral banded shrimp are neat. As for snails, I prefer a mix bag of turbos, nassarius, trochus, cerith, margarita, sometimes nerite, etc.
 
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Zionas

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Here’s my plan:

Once I cycle my tank and it’s ready for livestock and the first few fish I’m gonna put in 1 Blood Cleaner, 1 Skunk Cleaner, and 1 Peppermint for shrimp and maybe a couple of Cerith or Astraea snails. What do you think?
 

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Trochus are my favorites personally, but they tend to be harder to find around here. I also have used Astreas, Ceriths, and Margaritas. They just tend to need to be watched closer and flipped back upright if they get flipped upside down. IMO, Ceriths tend to be preferred targets of hermit crabs if you do mix them.
 

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I don’t plan to have any hermit crabs so I think I’m good.

What would be a good number of snails to have when my tank’s finished cycling and my first fish are in?
How big is the tank?
Will you have sand?
 

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My advice based on my 60 cube with sand.

My favorite snail is a fighting conch that keeps sand turned and clean. Strawberry conchs are amazing too, so either one is great. And with 95 gallon I would get both:p

trochus snails will eat algae/diatoms on glass and rocks. are better with sandbed because they can flip back over. They may even have babies in your tank.

astrea snails will eat algae/diatoms on glass and rocks. are not great with sandbed because they can not flip back over. But if you flip the beck over they will not starve and be fine. I have some in my tank and only need to flip once in a while.

cerith snails are great because they will eat algae/diatoms on glass, rocks and sand.

nassarius snails are good because they will eat uneaten food at the bottom of tank and stir sandbed.I really like my Tiger nassarius.

I know you said no hermits. I have a group of blue leg and they are a riot and get into lots of trouble. I can see why A lot of reefers don’t like them

I have a cleaner shrimp. It steals food from my coral.

I have a coral banded shrimp that I never see.

I have sexy shrimp that I absolutely love! But they are in a smaller tank with no fish. If you plan on fish with a big mouth, they may make an expensive dinner for the fish.

wishing you the best of luck!!!
 
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