What do sea hares eat?

[snodine]

I am thinking about getting a couple of sea hares as part of a group buy. I do not have an algae problem in my 130 gallon tank so I was wondering what they would eat. I have a couple of tangs and a fox face that eat dried algae from a clip. Would the sea hares eat the same thing? If so, would they eat from the clip?

Thank you in advance for your assistance.

 

[Elysia]

Do you know what genus and species you would be getting?

You can do a lot of reading on sea hares on the seaslugforum (http://www.seaslugforum.net)

I believe food preferences vary, both from species to species and depending on the age of the sea hare (younger ones eat red algae.) However, sea hares are used often in research, and have been fed algae that they would not normally eat in their natural environment. Aplysia californica is the species I think that is used in the US the most. They can be fed red algae their entire life, such as Gracilaria. There is a note from someone at the Birch that they feed Ulva to the hares in their touch tank. And according to the NIH-Aplysia Resourse Facility their hares will eat Romaine lettuce or Nori. Of course, being a species found on the California coast, they really wouldn't be appropriate for the high temps of reef tanks.

There is speculation that Aplysia dactylomela (pan-tropic, including Florida) may be a specialist feeder on Laurencia obtusa. Dolabrifera dolabrifera is also found in Florida, I believe.

 

[JasonD]

I'm not sure what speices I have but I bought a sea hare and put it into my starting 120gallon tank that unfortunately has a lot of hair algae in it.

Well this thing is a little monster eating everything green The onlly downside that I can tell is that it doesn't go by the rocks near my Vortech since the current is too much for it.

I only paid about twenty bucks for mine, I understand it comes from the tropics somewhere. Well worth the money in my opinion.

Jason

 

[Sk8r]

I have a dwarf sea hare (foster/smith)---no current is too much for it: it clings to the Sea Swirl or the outflow where its little ears are blown flat.
It eats hair algae, turf algae, apparently, and is, though very reluctantly, eating caulerpa, which is the problem for which I got it. It's a delightful little comic, the size of a golf ball. I understand they have a soft internal 'shell' and it acts like it. Moves with blinding speed for a 'snail', and goes everywhere: plug up any large exit from your tank.