The MUST HAVE workers in your tank that really earn their keep!

[Roosterjack]

I was always under the impression that both fox-face and butterflies were hell on corals....

 

[Jeeperz]

I have cerith, margarita, fancy nerite, and trochus snails for algae. They don't really seem to do much. I had a black nerite that was a wonder but he wandered out of the tank one night and didn't find him for a few days. Best snail ever. Rest in peace blackie. Have a tuxedo urchin that also doesn't do a whole bunch, my previous one did eat all sorts of algae. Mix of red leg and scarlet crabs that like to kill my ceriths. And my peaceful Halloween hermit who's always eating some type of algae or detritus. I have a tailspot blenny that picks on my watchman goby and pecks at the glass and some corals.

 

[don_chuwish]

Just snails and hermits. All the fish are just to enjoy viewing.

 

[DEWreefing]

If my fish are not working they get fired.

 

[Magellan]

Peppermint shrimp and Trochus snails come to mind, but there is nothing like a thriving sponge population in the cryptic area of an established reef. For me there has always been a correlation between an aquarium taking off and a healthy population of sponge in the overflow area.

Could you elaborate on that? Because I just realized that my pineapple sponge population exploded about the same time my tank started to, but I was told they consumed silicates and would gradually disappear as their food source did.

 

[Magellan]

I have a tuxedo urchin (he is a machine, eats all things algae) a lawnmower blenny, various snails, blue legged hermits, a 6 line wrasse, and a skunk cleaner shrimp that singlehandedly ended an ich outbreak when my tank was young. My clowns and damsel are the only wildlife that I got just to look at.

 

[Royce White]

I have a banded starfish and a tiger conch keeps sand clean. A six line wrasse for coral pest's and my yellow tail damsel does a good job of keeping his end of tank sand stirred and clean.

 

[TVV]

:mad:Turbo snails, trochus snails, hermit crabs, emerald crabs, lawnmower blenny, foxface for algae. Have no algae remaining or growing for 6 months now. Probably overreacted to the green hair and turf algae bloom and overstocked the cleaners. Most of the snails died, 2 Blennys died, foxface died probably due to starvation. The emerald crabs are now switching their diet to zoanthids and ate 50 blue kiss, 25 rastas and searching for more while I was out of town for a few days. Moved the zoas off the sand bed to save them hopefully. Would get the crabs out, but the crabs are impossible to catch due to the rocks and overcrowded biocube.

 

[jda]

Fish are hit-or-miss on algae. Pincushion Urchins from the Florida Keys have been hardy and effective algae eaters for me from hair to bubble to ulva or whatever - they do eat coralline, but I have so much, that I do not care. The urchins do the heavy lifting for me. Lettuce nudis are good too, but they require a LOT of algae and to turn the flow down.

Crabs (hermit and emerald) will not starve. They are not coral eaters, but if you do not feed them when most of the algae is gone, they will switch to coral. You cannot blame them, we would do the same if we needed to.

 

[TVV]

Fish are hit-or-miss on algae. Pincushion Urchins from the Florida Keys have been hardy and effective algae eaters for me from hair to bubble to ulva or whatever - they do eat coralline, but I have so much, that I do not care. The urchins do the heavy lifting for me. Lettuce nudis are good too, but they require a LOT of algae and to turn the flow down.

Crabs (hermit and emerald) will not starve. They are not coral eaters, but if you do not feed them when most of the algae is gone, they will switch to coral. You cannot blame them, we would do the same if we needed to.

I would never eat a coral!

 

[Ditryin]

My best "workers" are the yellow tang and starry blenny. I've never had any hair or bubble algae in the display. If I do get hair algae in my frag tank, I can move the frag to the display tank and the tang will promptly clean it off. Had a big one-spot foxface who was an awesome cleaner (never bothered corals as someone brought up a few posts back) but he died a few months ago. A strawberry crab lurks in the rocks. A diamond goby keeps the sand clean. Have had blue-leg hermits but got sick of them killing the snails so just down to a few of them. Now have a few huge snails. And a bunch of nassarius snails in the sand.

 

[Tastee]

Most of my pets earn their keep - Yellow Tang and Lawnmower Blenny are god for the algae, Sand Sifter Starfish and Nassarius Snail help with the sand bed, etc. The ones I got specifically for a job (GHA) are the Money Cowries and they are fantastic.

 

[Reesj]

5 trochus snails. Thats the only type of snailI cna buy here and man they are great at cleaning diatoms.

 

[ScottB]

I was always under the impression that both fox-face and butterflies were hell on corals....

Butterflies are certainly suspect, but foxface is a must have algae consumer in all of my tanks.

 

[H3rm1tCr@b]

Bristle worms. The bane of some's tank, the impossible - to - kill workers of mine. I believe I have a weird strain of fireworms to be specific, although they do not eat coral or anything else desired. I overfeed sometimes and they just explode out of the crevices in the rock and sand. It is actually really cool to watch because when I feed frozen (not as often as I would like) they fight my serpent star for pieces of shrimp. It is pretty epic to see them wrap themselves around his slithering tentacles, reminds me of some sort of kraken situation or something. Honestly, they do the most out of all the creatures in my system (other than the microbes and pods and stuff) and I don't see why people strive to eliminate them from their tanks when they can keep it from crashing (unless of course there are too many). That is my philosophy for the day!

 

[H3rm1tCr@b]

I just added a Leapord wrasse for pest control
A seahare for algae control
A sand tiger conch for sand bed.

If my tank was large enough for a sea hare, it would have been one of the first things in my tank! I love their squishy faces, they look so stupid and adorable at the same time!

 

[Brad Vaughn]

Wrasse for pests, hermits snails and urchins for algae, bristletooth tang for algae, sand sifting stars and diamond goby for cleaning the sand, serpent stars for detritus and any leftover food. Sometimes peppermint shrimp for small aptasia. Angels for hydroids

 

[Dw79]

Mexican turbo and Trochus snails. Algae's worst nightmare!!