Clean up crew list??

[xycose]

Hi everyone

I ordered "the package" from TBS but unfortunately I only got the first half of my order of live rock and sand, and the second half of live rock and clean up crew is not able to be shipped for a few months so I'm looking at other options.

Currently, I'm thinking of ordering from LiveAquaria with this list:
2 40lb boxes of Walt Smith's Reef Rock 2.1 Rock
1 serpent star
1 brittle star
3 peppermint shrimp
72 total Dwarf Blue Leg Hermit
50 Scarlet Reef Hermit Crab
3 Sea Cucumber
30 Nassarius Snails
30 Astraea Snails
30 Cerith Snails


Does this seem like a decent list for more rock and a clean up crew to you guys? Any suggestions? This will be a tank with corals and some fish in the long run. Right now just my rock(with sponges, feather dusters and a couple tiny urchins, few snails and hermit crabs that came attached) and sand is in the tank and nothing else. Ammonia and nitrites are at 0 for a couple days straight now.

 

[Indymann99]

What size tank do you have?

 

[xycose]

Whoops, guess that is an important piece I left out. The tank is 125g.

I'm thinking of cutting back on the snails a bit and maybe going only dwarf blue leg hermits and no scarlet's after talking to the TBS guy, but I'm open to suggestions and advice from everyone.

 

[Indymann99]

That cleaner pack seems about 2x TOO LARGE...

my 0.02

 

[Bobbitworm13]

NO sea cucumbers whatsoever. When they get stressed they basically puke their organs out and kill everything in the tank. Not a fun time.

 

[jlmawp]

122 hermits is a LOT of hermits. You’re going to end up with a lot of dead hermits and snails. They’ll gang up on everything and kill it because they won’t have enough food to go around. I would go with 10-15 of them. 20 tops.

 

[mcgyvr]

122 hermits is a LOT of hermits. You're going to end up with a lot of dead hermits and snails. They'll gang up on everything and kill it because they won't have enough food to go around. I would go with 10-15 of them. 20 tops.

I fully agree

 

[xycose]

only 10-15 even if they are the small blue leg ones? It seems like every website I go to that sells them recommend closer to 1 per gallon for the dwarf blue legs, although maybe they are just trying to sell more hermit crabs..?

 

[jlmawp]

only 10-15 even if they are the small blue leg ones? It seems like every website I go to that sells them recommend closer to 1 per gallon for the dwarf blue legs, although maybe they are just trying to sell more hermit crabs..?

Bingo.

Come here to the people who aren’t profiting from you to get your advice

 

[MuShu]

I would go for scarlet over blue. The blue will kill your snails for food.

I would also probably go with 10-15 nasarius snails and add 15 trochus snails.

Also, I would not add all that clean up crew at once- it will starve to death. Start with 5 of each snail and 2-3 hermits. After a few months, add more. Do this until your cuc is keeping up with the tank. You may really not need hundreds of snails, or you may need a lot more depending on if your tank is receiving direct sunlight. Either way, you are wasting your money to have that much cuc right off the bat.

 

[ctroms]

I agree with everything that has been said in this thread. When I started in this hobby I followed recommendations about CUC's. Over the years you make observations about what works and what doesn't. That being said I will not put starfish, sea cuke's, or urchins in my tanks. I also don't like to add dwarf hermit crabs (Red or Blue). Reason is if there is a fish death I like to remove it and if possible look at it through a scope(ie. fish disease). Nassarius snails may eat small sleeping fish. At this point I only will put turbo snails in the tank. The worst thing you have to deal with is them knocking over new frag's, which can be a pain. My tank is roughly the same size (120g) and I use 5 turbo snails. I don't know if there are any scientific study's done to collaborate this but in personal experience my tanks with healthy populations of copepods and amphipods run "cleaner" than without.