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Clean-up crew for brackish water
Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 1:01 am
by puffanutter
What do you guys use to clean your tanks in a light brackish water set-up? The sg is 1.005. I have a figure 8 puffer and a couple of bumble bee gobies. I put 3 ghost shrimp in today and the fig 8 ate one already.
Does anyone have any ideas?? What I mean by clean-up crew is how people keep plecostomous or loaches in freshwater tanks to keep the algae down.
Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 1:10 am
by Phaedrus
Only thing you can do is keep up with regular maintenance. Vaccuum the substrate. Do water changes. Remove uneaten food promptly. Don't overstock, and over filter. When algae forms, as it inevitably does, simply clean it.
If your water is high in phosphates you could try some of the phosphate removal products that are out there. Seachem purigen has helped me keep my nitrates really low, but even that hasn't stopped the might diatom juggernaught.
Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 5:54 pm
by Tihsho
Yup, totally agree with Phaedrus! Only good clean up crew for brackish is a algea pad and a gravel vac
Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 7:43 pm
by londonloco
that sucks!
Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 8:41 pm
by Tihsho
Thats basically what brackish entails. And its totally worth it!
Posted: Wed Apr 26, 2006 10:03 am
by puffernuke
you are your own crew up crew
Posted: Wed Apr 26, 2006 1:35 pm
by The Fisherman
heh, yeah, algae scrubber is your clean up crew!
Posted: Wed Apr 26, 2006 2:08 pm
by Woland
Totally correct.
Yet; some mollies does a bit of cleaning and is a nice addition to a brackish tank.
Posted: Wed Apr 26, 2006 5:38 pm
by Tihsho
Woland wrote:
Yet; some mollies does a bit of cleaning and is a nice addition to a brackish tank.
Yeah and you will be breeding your own puff food
Posted: Mon May 01, 2006 1:38 pm
by Snausy
Actually my brackish tank has several snails in it. The LFS(a good small one with knowledgeable people) had a few snails in it's brackish tanks last year and I asked about them.
Seems there is a snail that is native to brackish water and they had a few(only come in once a year for some reason). So I picked up about six thinking they would be puffer food(5 bucks a pop).
Needless to say I was pleasantly surprised when they went right to work on the algae and do a great job of cleaning up. I've lost two over the year but they are about to be back in stock so I'll pick up five more.
If it wasn't for those snails the tank would look much worse. They literally strip the algae from the wood and after the algae builds up inside on surfaces for a week and I'm wondering if they are all dead, BAM in one night they will clean it all up. I love em.
The snails are a chocolate brown if that helps anyone. Don't know the name. They are about half an inch in diameter.
Posted: Mon May 01, 2006 3:32 pm
by Raphael
Maybe a photo would help. What puffer do you have?
Posted: Mon May 01, 2006 3:46 pm
by RTR
The snails are likely Olive Nerites, whixh are at home in a variety of water conditions. Their shells are quite hard, and their normal posture is quite "defensive" in that they expose a bare minimum of flesh to their surroundings, If the puffer is less than a large GSP, the chances of survival are fairly good, but never guaanteed,
Posted: Mon May 01, 2006 3:51 pm
by Phaedrus
snausy - How high is your SG?
How high of an SG can olive nerites handle? If they eat diatoms, and can survive high-end brackish I'm all on that!
Posted: Mon May 01, 2006 4:18 pm
by RTR
Their offspring/larvae are planktonic in SW. Most of the genus is marine. The Olive and least one other species travel upstream as far as very light BW to straight FW. Anything BW should suit them, but don't just dump - drip acclimate if they are in quite different conditions.
Posted: Mon May 01, 2006 4:20 pm
by Phaedrus
Interesting... I'll have to do some more reasearch and keep an eye out for some next time i'm at the lfs.