What sort of cleanup crew?

[Duddly01]

I have turbo snails, nassarius snails, hermit crabs, queen conch and brittle star in my 50gal. reef, but I don't think many of those would be appropriate to my seahorse tank. I know the hermits are out, and the nassarius are pretty fast at getting to any food that hits the sand bed or anywhere they can reach, so they are likely not good. Not to mention my nano's sand bed isn't deep enough for them. What would you recommend to keep the tank clean?

The sand bed is only about 1" deep, 20lbs. of LR, 24gal. DX nanocube. Only current inhabitants are two juvenile sea horses. It was used as a quarantine tank for quite some time and it still has the biomedia that I am going to be removing and turning that chamber into a refugium. With that and the Red Caulerpa in the display I should be able to keep nitrates and phospates in check.

 

[redi45]

Hi your hermit crabs make a very good tank mate and cleaner I use them in my 90 seahorse tank yuo should get rid of your brittle star though as he is a big threat to you horses the snails you have all work fine you could also put in a tuxedo sea urchins as they work mostly at night and are a great help scarlet skunk cleaner shrimp are also very good to have as the seahorses are vunerable to all types of things they can help out alot the peppernt shrimp also works well with this combo type of combo you should be set this is what I keep in my seahorse tank and works great I have been keeping them for 5 years and have no prouplems good luck and happy horse keeping

 

[Duddly01]

I think you misunderstood. I don't have anything (except a few hitchhiker snails, worms, etc.) in my seahorse tank yet. Those cleaners are in my other tank.

 

[Fredfish]

This may sound strange, but bristle worms are probably your best cleanup crew. They are pretty much all detrirovours and carion eaters. Just pull a few of the bigger ones every once in a while so they don't start to compete with your horses for food.

You could put a few nasarius in there if you like them. They don't eat that much.

I personally don't like turbo snails. They just don't seem to survive very well. If you can get your hands on some smaller snail like Stomatella varia, they would do much better for you.

Fred

 

[c-horseman]

how about peppermint shrimp? you can be aptasia-free at the same time.

 

[pledosophy]

How is that blue berry gorgonia doing? How long have you had it? I love those things.

 

[Fredfish]

I personally find shrimp to be very aggressive feeders. Havn't tried them with seahorses.

Fred

 

[Duddly01]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9381316#post9381316 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by pledosophy
How is that blue berry gorgonia doing? How long have you had it? I love those things.

Just bought it last Saturday, same time as the Seahorses. Needed a hitching post after all.

Seems to be doing good. The little blue "berries" open up like little flowers, looks cool.

 

[c-horseman]

I personally find shrimp to be very aggressive feeders. Havn't tried them with seahorses.

it's hit and miss. i had shrimp with clowns and yeah they were very aggressive. then when i kept horses i was worried, but it turns out alot of the time shrimp are deathly afraid of horses - even the big shrimp (instinct?). anyways if that's the case it works out fine, the shrimp only come out occasionally during the day and clean up at night.

 

[whatnot45]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9373345#post9373345 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Fredfish
This may sound strange, but bristle worms are probably your best cleanup crew. They are pretty much all detrirovours and carion eaters. Just pull a few of the bigger ones every once in a while so they don't start to compete with your horses for food.

You could put a few nasarius in there if you like them. They don't eat that much.

I personally don't like turbo snails. They just don't seem to survive very well. If you can get your hands on some smaller snail like Stomatella varia, they would do much better for you.

Fred

I have to disagree with this advice... Bristle worms are not good seahorse tank mates. In small numbers they are fine, but when they get too numerous and large, seahorses may try to eat them, or brush up against them by accident, and this can be fatal. If a seahorse were to try and snick a bristle worm, the bristles get lodged into the seahorses snout, making it extreamly painful for the seahorse to eat, thsu they will starve themselves unless they are forcefed with a tube....

 

[Fredfish]

I doubt very much any seahorse would attempt to eat a large bristle worm. Now, P. fridmani, thats a different story. They will clean out your worms in short order.

I have also not seen any evidence that bristle worms have ever been responsible for the death of a single seahorse.

If seahorses were so fragile, they would not survive in their natural environment.

Fred

 

[Duddly01]

What I ended up going with are:
2 - Turbo snails
2 - Nassarius snails
3 - Cerith snails

Those along with a couple bristle worms and Stomatella hitchhikers I got with the live rock and I should be okay.

 

[c-horseman]

I have also not seen any evidence that bristle worms have ever been responsible for the death of a single seahorse.

i think the mod at seahorse.org had a bristleworm "attack" a horse after the horse unknowingly tried to wrap around it or bothered it or something. i don't remember but it may have even been video'd. the horse's body got burned and eventually died.
now it wasn't the bristleworm's fault, but the end result was the horse's death that could have been avoided.
having said that, i think it's an extremely rare case and i don't mind bristleworms in my tank

 

[reefD]

to answer your first post....REEF SAFE hermits , snails, and shrimp wont bother seahorses. maybe a dawf seahorse may be bothered but all others will benifit from the cleaning abilities of this crew. snails should not pose any problems. any kind should be okay as long as its reef safe its seahorse safe. shrimp now i speak of typical totally reef safe shrimp. like pepermints, cleaners. and fire shrimps. all mentioned are fine. hermits now as i said again those big monster NON reef safe hermits may and very well be a threat but all reef safe hermit crabs will pose no problems. ive even kept harlequins with my ponies with no issues ever.

 

[reefD]

what you ended up gettings is just fine. i would add a shrimp also as they hunt out uneaten foods that your ponies dont eat. when feeding horses its best to give them ample targets to "shnick" at so its common for alot of uneaten food to get swept under a rock. thats when shrimp smell it out and dig it up from under the rock. very beneficial!

 

[reefD]

those with issues from shrimp gobbling food up before seahorse can must use a simple trick. FEED the shrimp a small chunck of something so he is busy for a few minutes. then feed horses. i use the same tactics when feeding my sun polyps as shrimp try to pick off food that the coral is consuming.

 

[JennyL]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9395408#post9395408 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Fredfish
I doubt very much any seahorse would attempt to eat a large bristle worm. Now, P. fridmani, thats a different story. They will clean out your worms in short order.

I have also not seen any evidence that bristle worms have ever been responsible for the death of a single seahorse.

If seahorses were so fragile, they would not survive in their natural environment.

Fred

Fred,
I know of 5 differant experienced seahorse keepers that had horses killed by bristle worms. I am sure there are other incidents we have not heard about.

It's not a matter of the horse trying to eat the bristleworm but going after the same piece of food and accidently snick up the worm and it gets lodged in the snout. Sometimes the horse is able to spit it out but if the worm is far enough into the snout it's a painful death sentence.

In my opinion, it is not worth the risk of keeping something harmful in their tank.
An enclosed system cannot be compared to the open sea.

 

[reefD]

yeah dont purposly add them. youll get some for sure and most likly they will be small enough. another thought to help keep bristle in check in seahorse tank is use a coral bandit. the regular ones can be too big so i would use a purple/blue CBS or yellow as they stay small and good chance they wont ever bother the horses.

 

[pledosophy]

IME the only shrimp I trust with sehaorses are peppermint shrimp. I have kept several peppermint shrimp with different species of seahorses without issue.

IME cleaner shrimp do not make good sehaorse tankmates. The cleaning activity can cause much stress, and they have been photographed opening the pouch and eating fry.

CBS are not seahorse safe IMO, the two should not be mixed.

Bristleworms have always been a fact of live for me. PErsonally i have never had any problems with seahorses snicking a bristleworm, but it does seem to be posted by keepers often. When i switched from my 75g to my 65g I dipped all of my rock in 1.040 for ten minutes to rid it of worms. I was shocked to find hunreds of bristleworms inlcuding one that was 4'. Even though i have never had problems, I hate bristleworms. They are horrible. I hate them. Yuck Spew Spew Spew.

JME