Clean up crew suggestions for 120 gal
 

Hey folks,
I was hoping for some suggestions for a clean up crew for a 120 gal sps reef.
Please feel free to mention any rare and colorful reef safe critters.
Thanks all

I was browsing through a website and read...

• Question: "How many snails and crabs do I need for my tank?"
  Answer: A good rule of thumb is 1 crab for every gallon, and 1 snail for every gallon and a half. This is a good starting point, from here you can judge for yourself whether or not your clean up crew needs some additional recruitments.

I'm a little bit reluctant to believe that you would need so many critters?

That's a LOT of critters. IMO i'd stay away from hermits. I will never put them in my tank again. I have only 2 snails alive now since the hermits will pick off any that come down from the glass. I have a decently fish stocked 150 gallon with ~10-15 hermits, 2 snails, 2 urchins... that's it. Lots of other hitch-hikers come out at night, like the no-shelled snails(can't think of the name). Everything gets cleaned up well. I had a copperband die under a rock a couple weeks ago, couldn't get it without major reconstruction, and it was gone by the morning. I should add that my convict goby stirs up my sand bed for me, so I'm not adding CUC to take care of that.

You basically need critters to handle your fish waste, that many critters may be useful once your tank is fully loaded, but as you start out, get 5-10 at a time and take it as it goes. Once you notice unprocessed waste, add some more.

This site had pretty good answers on it:

http://theaquariumwiki.com/Salt_Wate..._Clean-up_Crew

cool, thanks bud.

That's ridiculous. The "and" part is even more ridiculous.

In my 90 I have 1 black brittle starfish (the only large starfish with good long-term survival and safe for fish), 3 Ring Cowries, 4 Astraea snails, 1 Fighting Conch, 2 Peppermint shrimp.

Be aware that hermits will eat snails when they get hungry.

I have a 125g reef which I have the following in:

4 red hermit crabs
3 orange "halloween" hermit crabs
10-15 blue leg hermit crabs

2 emerald crabs

8 narsarrius snails
2 turbo snails
10 cerith snails
15 astrea snails

1 skunk cleaner shrimp
1 fire shrimp
1 coral banded shrimp

I considered going with only snails to avoid the hermits taking them out over time but I love watching the hermits do their thing. I especially like the red ones. They have huge yellow eyes. The orange ones are pretty cool too. If you go the hermit route you will have to periodically replace snails.

I originally bought some regular red legged hermits. They completely wiped out all the margarita snails I bought.
Now I stick to Left-handed or blue-legged hermits. They are smaller and seem to be less dangerous.

I also stick with Astrea snails (or similar) for algae cleaning, etc because their shell design allows them to escape inside from hermits.

I currently have 6 red-legged hermits, 15 blue-legged hermits, 6 left-handed hermits, 1 mexican Turbo snail, 3 Black spiny snails, 15 Astrea snails, lots of stomatella snails, 2 cleaner shrimp, 3 peppermint shrimp, and 2 sexy shrimp

Cool thanks for all the ideas folks

As a reef tank matures it developed its own natural clean up crew of mini snails, bristle worms, pods, brittle stars etc. In my 120gal system the only store-bought inverts I have are two abalone and a tiger tail cucumber. I would like to also have my tuxedo urchin in there but the overflow has a knack for killing them.

So in other words keep whatever you want. Just do your research to make sure that what you get won't starve to death or kill your other tank inhabitants. Abalone are the only snails I care for. I've tried at least 6 common species and none of them could hold a torch to abalone. I believe that crabs are more trouble than they're worth. And why bother with buying a big brittle star when you can easily have a million free little ones?

This picture is a bit misleading. There are five fish in the display, one of them being a +2' snowflake moray so this is also a high bioload system.

http://i254.photobucket.com/albums/h...o/IMG_8602.jpg