diatoms and clean up crew

[pondy]

Will hermits crabs, astrea, nassur..., and turbo snails eat and live off of Diatoms?

 

[deltablack22]

Not that I've ever seen. I have heard though that cerith snails will eat them, but I havent ever seen mine do much damage on it.

 

[pondy]

so I guess my next queston is is should I feed the clean up crew a little food so that they have some thing to eat? I do have some algea but not a whole lot.

 

[earlybird]

Originally Posted by pondy
so I guess my next queston is is should I feed the clean up crew a little food so that they have some thing to eat? I do have some algea but not a whole lot.
I wouldn't. They may expect food. Foce them to look around break up your diatoms. Diatoms will be gone in a week or two.

 

[redinator]

Feed them. Snails often die from starvation in home aquariums. Unless your tank is overrun with algae, place a algae sheet in your tank every other day.

 

[pondy]

so should I just feed the snails then? I do get a pretty good green algea on the glass that grows in about 2 days and I scrape it off every few days, they seem to be doing fine. Will this algea be good enough or should I still give the snails an algea sheet?

 

[reefreak29]

Originally Posted by pondy
Will hermits crabs, astrea, nassur..., and turbo snails eat and live off of Diatoms?
everything you mentioned eats diatoms except the hermits that i know of, dont feed the snails till the algae is gone then you will need to supplement with algae sheets

 

[johndodd]

Originally Posted by redinator
Feed them. Snails often die from starvation in home aquariums. Unless your tank is overrun with algae, place a algae sheet in your tank every other day.

I just saw this post and tried to find more information on Algae Sheets. I didn't find any. Can someone please tell me where to get them?
thanks
jdd

 

[earlybird]

Google Seaweed sheets or nori seaweed. Basically the seaweed/algae that they wrap california rolls in. LFS's sell them but at a bigger mark up than a local asian food store.

 

[johndodd]

Cool, it seems I already have some. I bought an Algae Eating Tang yesterday and the lfs recommended a sea weed sheet to give her a couple times a week. I guess she'll share with the snails? lfs said to just clip it in my mag float.
jdd

 

[miaheatlvr]

Originally Posted by pondy
Will hermits crabs, astrea, nassur..., and turbo snails eat and live off of Diatoms?

Good clean-up crew, Remove all silicates fro your water, Make sure you are using only RO/DI water and get your nitrates down to minimum, this will all help control your diatoms, but it should disapate in time anyway..