CUC, Benefits and challenges! Share your experiences!!

[BryanM]

It is generally accepted that we should all have a clean up crew. Its makeup and size, benefits and challenges, are all debatable topics however.

The most interesting relationship, to me, is the pistol shrimp and watchman goby. Did you know why these two form a relationship? The pistol shrimp is nearly blind and the goby serves as an early warning system for the otherwise easy prey. Why does the goby serve? The pistol shrimp is the one that digs out their burrow. So the shrimp provides a home, and the goby provides a level of protection.

Urchins?! what the heck!! Where are you taking my frag, I just wanted you to eat algae. Dang man, you're a packrat!

Crabs, my favorite critter to hate... I've just had bad luck as they have all ended up nipping at one or two corals... But they are fascinating to watch, picking at rock work, and at least in my case they grew FAST in my tank.

Sea cucumbers... Are they worth the risk? Incredibly efficient detritus consumers, but if stressed their defense mechanism can lead to them expelling their internal organs which can release toxins in to the water... Not exactly worth it if you ask me :(

Fighting conch... While I have not had any yet in my tank, they are on the short list to get. Everything I've read is they are a workhorse... Churning over sand, aerating as they go, detritus consumers, leftovers, help to reduce nitrates and phosphates... What's not to like?

All of these things I never knew about before starting my journey in to reefing... How about you? Do tell!

 

[Happy Fish KC]

It is generally accepted that we should all have a clean up crew. Its makeup and size, benefits and challenges, are all debatable topics however.

The most interesting relationship, to me, is the pistol shrimp and watchman goby. Did you know why these two form a relationship? The pistol shrimp is nearly blind and the goby serves as an early warning system for the otherwise easy prey. Why does the goby serve? The pistol shrimp is the one that digs out their burrow. So the shrimp provides a home, and the goby provides a level of protection.

Urchins?! what the heck!! Where are you taking my frag, I just wanted you to eat algae. Dang man, you're a packrat!

Crabs, my favorite critter to hate... I've just had bad luck as they have all ended up nipping at one or two corals... But they are fascinating to watch, picking at rock work, and at least in my case they grew FAST in my tank.

Sea cucumbers... Are they worth the risk? Incredibly efficient detritus consumers, but if stressed their defense mechanism can lead to them expelling their internal organs which can release toxins in to the water... Not exactly worth it if you ask me :(

Fighting conch... While I have not had any yet in my tank, they are on the short list to get. Everything I've read is they are a workhorse... Churning over sand, aerating as they go, detritus consumers, leftovers, help to reduce nitrates and phosphates... What's not to like?

All of these things I never knew about before starting my journey in to reefing... How about you? Do tell!

I've seen pencil urchins do great work.

We have a FAT cucumber who makes great work of our main tank, whenever he isn't sleeping, but he does great work! I would argue ours is more of a sea potato, and he's very much worth the risk as he can be held and moved very easily without any fuss. We just plop him onto a pile of algae build-up and he just goes right to work.

Lastly I love looking at the shrimp. We've got Kuekenthals which are super voracious. And any cleaner shrimp is always fun to throw in with our tangs or bigger fish.

I hope your tank is super clean! Have a great day!
-Carl

 

[MossyFroggyLove]

Hermit crab, cleans hair algae and threatens to eat damaged corals