ArowanaLover1902
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I've been reefing for several years now and I think I have enough experience to begin questioning a few things in the hobby. Obviously from the title, I'm skeptical of hermit crabs being truly beneficial in a reef tank.
When I first started in the hobby my absolute favorite thing was my hermit crabs, I remember them bustling around in my empty tank (it was nearing the end of its cycle and I added some hermits to help clean up the cycle algae). I really enjoyed watching them eat the fish food and run around. I noticed that the algae on the sandbed and rocks was going away and I was really pleased that I had a good clean up crew (at the time it consisted of snails, hermits, and an emerald crab). I was a little worried that I kept finding seeing my hermits wearing my snail shells, but I assumed that the fragile snail had died and the hermit had helpfully scavenged the dead body and was using the shell. In the years to follow, I saw them eat anything that died in the tank and I noted they weren't at all picky. For this reason they are great to have around, they are awesome scavengers and they are pretty cool to see in the tank, they add a lot of life.
Later, when I ran into problems with algae, I added a few more hermits to the tank (my course of algae removal is: manual removal, replenish CUC, turn off lights), the remaining snails I had died (I knew by know that hermits ate snails but I figured that hermits were likely better, after all thats what I had been told) but I didn't see them eating any of the algae and by the time I turned the lights back on they had instead taken the chance to eat some of the LPS weakened from light depletion. I then went to my LFS and picked up a turbo snail, a few ceriths, an emerald crab and some margaritas and threw them in the tank and algae was finally eliminated. I saw that the hermits really hadn't done anything to help and had actually hurt the tank by eating the LPS.
Now my tank has only about 5 hermits in a 35 gallon reef, along with 5 nassarius, 1 turbo, 2 margaritas, and 2 ceriths. My hermits are always stomping on my poor zoanthids, causing them to close up to avoid the grabbing claws of the hermits, eating the food I try to give to my gobies and pistol shrimp, and forever tormenting my helpful snails as well. I no longer have an emerald crab in the tank, they always get too big and are in my sump now so when a bit of turf algae popped up in the tank two days ago I figured I'd let the hermits try to get it. It's still there now and I'm really considering giving them all to my LFS, I'm tired of them. Will there be any real repercussions from getting rid of them, after all, in my experience all they do is scavenge dead things and my nassarius are far better at that?
I'd love to see what the general consensus of their merit is so here is a poll, I'd love to hear about your experiences as well as if you've found that only certain species are acceptable (I've found that all hermits are bad, but maybe there are some I missed or you disagree with).
When I first started in the hobby my absolute favorite thing was my hermit crabs, I remember them bustling around in my empty tank (it was nearing the end of its cycle and I added some hermits to help clean up the cycle algae). I really enjoyed watching them eat the fish food and run around. I noticed that the algae on the sandbed and rocks was going away and I was really pleased that I had a good clean up crew (at the time it consisted of snails, hermits, and an emerald crab). I was a little worried that I kept finding seeing my hermits wearing my snail shells, but I assumed that the fragile snail had died and the hermit had helpfully scavenged the dead body and was using the shell. In the years to follow, I saw them eat anything that died in the tank and I noted they weren't at all picky. For this reason they are great to have around, they are awesome scavengers and they are pretty cool to see in the tank, they add a lot of life.
Later, when I ran into problems with algae, I added a few more hermits to the tank (my course of algae removal is: manual removal, replenish CUC, turn off lights), the remaining snails I had died (I knew by know that hermits ate snails but I figured that hermits were likely better, after all thats what I had been told) but I didn't see them eating any of the algae and by the time I turned the lights back on they had instead taken the chance to eat some of the LPS weakened from light depletion. I then went to my LFS and picked up a turbo snail, a few ceriths, an emerald crab and some margaritas and threw them in the tank and algae was finally eliminated. I saw that the hermits really hadn't done anything to help and had actually hurt the tank by eating the LPS.
Now my tank has only about 5 hermits in a 35 gallon reef, along with 5 nassarius, 1 turbo, 2 margaritas, and 2 ceriths. My hermits are always stomping on my poor zoanthids, causing them to close up to avoid the grabbing claws of the hermits, eating the food I try to give to my gobies and pistol shrimp, and forever tormenting my helpful snails as well. I no longer have an emerald crab in the tank, they always get too big and are in my sump now so when a bit of turf algae popped up in the tank two days ago I figured I'd let the hermits try to get it. It's still there now and I'm really considering giving them all to my LFS, I'm tired of them. Will there be any real repercussions from getting rid of them, after all, in my experience all they do is scavenge dead things and my nassarius are far better at that?
I'd love to see what the general consensus of their merit is so here is a poll, I'd love to hear about your experiences as well as if you've found that only certain species are acceptable (I've found that all hermits are bad, but maybe there are some I missed or you disagree with).
