Clean up crew advice--Timing as well as makeup for rehabbing tank

Richard Hercher · Jan 11, 2019

Hey all, looking for some advice on clean up crew. I'm in kind of a paradox: when is it OK to add inverts to a dirty tank? Thinking about a tuxedo urchin, Nassarius, astraeas, and maybe a star of some kind (Not kean on getting more hermits, but open to other critters)

For background:
I've got a 75gal FOWLR that has been neglected for about 2 years following a baby and move. Lost all but 2 clownfish, and wiped out my cleaning crew. Tank was over run with algae. About a 2inch sand bed that's about 5 years old with green algae growing on it.

But recovery is commencing. I've managed to knock out all of the hair algae and bryopsis growing on the rocks with peroxide, using GFO in my canister filter to try suck up the phosphates, but turf algae and red slime are filling in the void left by hair algae. I'm doing weekly 10Gal water changes and monthly canister scrubs (haven't committed to replacing the pads yet, but rinsing those at least). I've got a cheap API saltwater test kit coming today to start testing and set up a chart to start tracking parameters, and this weekend I'm replacing the 6 year old single T8 bulb and fixture that looks pretty pink with a low cost LED bar that is marketed as 10000K.

Saveafish · Jan 11, 2019

I wouldn't get any hermits. I'd start with snails. Remember don't go crazy on a clean up crew. They poop and eat. If you go too heavy they'll poop lots the first few days and start another slow spike. Than they won't have enough to eat later. I'd get a couple Mexican turbos and start their. Maybe 4 of them. Than about 5-10 nassiurs snails for digging in sand bed. Start there for a week or so. Adjust their dies or amount of growth with lighting. They don't need heave light.

Richard Hercher · Jan 12, 2019

Thanks for the quick reply! I hit up the LFS, parameters are good but phosphate is a little over (which explains why the algae keeps coming back). Also found out my 8 year old salinity floatmeter is reading low, but the actual salt levels were higher than I thought. Picked up a couple of large Cerith snails (they had a decent price on them, and I liked the fact that they like to play in the sand and crawl on the rocks, I'll add nassiurs later), a fighting conch, and two urchins: a 1" diameter pincushion who was carrying around a sand dollar skeleton, and a large 3.5" in royal purple urchin.

Did two rounds of drip acclamation, a group drip for the small ones, and a separate acclamation for the big urchin. The big guy freaked, water went cloudy (I assume it spawned). Transferred into the tank, everybody was moving a lot except the big urchin, but it did have a lot of activity on it's surface and did move a bit. Got some great pics of the conch eating the algae on the sand by my glass.

Sadly, my wife tells me the big urchin has dropped a few spines while I'm at work, and neither it nor the conch has moved since last night.

Richard Hercher · Jan 18, 2019

Update: conch is doing fine. The big purple urchin just wouldn’t eat, was dropping spines everywhere, just went back to the LFS yesterday. They kindly traded him for a smaller one just under 3 inches across, green with purple tips, but my 7yo was devastated (word to the wise, while naming a purple urchin "Prince" is a fun adventure, maybe waiting to establish pets before naming them might be better). But we’ve started a morning routine of water testing and charting (Temp, salinity, pH) and a weekly nitrate/nitrite and ammonia test.

Good news is, new urchin and the 4 turbos are all out, moving, and eating. I have two AquaClear powerbeads with filter baskets, and put a media bag of Phosguard in one to act as a poor mans Media Reactor while they break it down. But my rock work looks like the rolling hills of Scotland with all the hair algae again.