whats the best kind of sea urchin to get
 

well after finally putting some snails in my tank i was glad to see that the moray didnt show any interest in them,on the other hand the birdmouth wrasse loved picking them up and smashing them against the lr,not the best $6.00 ive ever spent but atleast the the birdmouth is happy,so no crabs no snails what about a urchin any ideas on what ones would survive ,or any other ideas for a cleanup crew ?.

I've got a black spiny urchin that seems indestructable.

the spines on those guys look painfull,does it bother your coraline algae ?,if not anyone have one for sale the bigger the better.

Eats any and all algae, doesn't bother the urchin whether it's coraline or not.

i guess that ones out then any other ideas please post thanks..john

I thought the majority of urchins available for purchase ate coralline. Please correct me if I'm wrong :confused:

http://wetwebmedia.com/urchinsii.htm

It is my understanding that all the species commonly kept in aquariums will eat almost anything. Generally people seem to select a particular species based on size. I had a tuxedo/royal urchin (Mespilia globulus), generally these ones are quite popular as they have very short spines and stay about the size of a tennis ball. One concern related to size is destructiveness. Urchins have a tendency to cruise through anything that gets in their way. They will knock over a coral at some point in time. Do keep tank size, coral concentration in mind.

It has been said that urchins actually contribute to coraline growth by spreading it (or it's spores or whatnot?) around. I didn't have mine long enough to say. More discussion of this here: http://www.google.ca/search?sourceid...pread+coraline

Interestingly, some species are very long lived, up to 200 years!

I have three urchins in the 230g. Two tuxedo's and one long spined.

I've never seen the long spine on the rock as much as the tuxedo's but perhaps he browses at nite. I suspect he knocks some frags over from time to time, but my decorator crab does too. Urchins are very cool, I myself wouldn't be without them. :smile:

I have a long spined urchin (echinometra viridis) that I hardly ever see during the day. He cruises out of his hiding spot just as the lights are going off in the evening, then disappears into some crevice for the daytime again (he's really good at hide-n-seek). So far I have only had one rock avalanch that I suspect he was the cause of. It took me over an hour to re-stack the rockwork and get everthing sitting solid again. :evil: My coraline has been spreading very well with him in there. I was concerned for a while that he would not find enough to eat, since I have little algae other than the coraline, but he seems to be doing just fine. He's really cool when I can see him. :biggrin:

My tuxedo urchins have very little impact, if any, on my coraline growth. They are very cool to have in the tank. I wouldn't have a tank without one either :cool: