Question On Snails And Crabs....

[ChitownRomeo]

Hey guys, sorry I been gone so long. Cancer was getting the best of me and now I'm doing better so I decided to get my 90 gallon back in full swing. This will be my 4th reef but I just want some advice cause sometimes I go over board. I want a good cleanup crew. I was thinking 10 Scarlet hermits since they are not snail killers like their cousins. Well at least not in my experience. Right now I have a VERY low bio load with just a mated pair of clowns, 2 chromis and 2 Bangaii Cardinals. So I'm thinking 10 Scarlet Crabs, 4 Trochus snails, 1 Fighting Conch and about 10 Nass Snails since I feed Rod's food, some of it drops to the bottom so I need some snails that will gobble it up. What you think or suggest.

 

[DaveK]

Clean up crews are mostly a matter of personal preference and what you are keeping in the tank.

My own choice would be to leave out the fighting conch, go with about 20 trochus snails and double everything else.

Some people even go so far as to add 1 snail and 1 hermit per gallon of water, but I think that's way too much in most cased.

All that being said, I wouldn't call you plan wrong.

 

[PSU4ME]

Glad you're getting a new tank going!

The way I look at it is that it is personal preference but some of the vendors out there are pretty knowledgeable. From my experience, I like to go with half of what John at reefcleaners suggests, let them integrate into the tank, die off and then I stick build it back up depending on my issues, bioload and frankly things I like. It works well.

I like Scarlets a lot and if you have enough algae to support a Mexican turbo, they are worth more than the damage they cause so I tend to get one.... had 2 in my 120

 

[Oxylebius]

I prefer to have lower numbers of each species and more variety of species, only a couple of each, depending on the size of your tank, for my 65g tank, I like to have.
2 Astraea Turbo Snail (Astraea tecta)
2 Banded Trochus Snail (Trochus sp.)
5 Cerith Snail (Cerithium sp.)
5 Nerite Snail (Nerita sp.)
5 Nassarius snail (Nassarius sp.)
4 Scarlet Reef Hermit Crab (Paguristes cadenati)
4 Electric Blue Hermit Crab (Calcinus elegans)

 

[ChitownRomeo]

Thanks alot!