Need cleaning crew ideas for 20 gallon

[usirchchris]

Right now all I have in the tank is a domino damsel and a cowfish. I know the cow will need a bigger tank...right now he is the size of a grape, and I am in the works of setting up a 200 gallon. Just want to know what I should use for a cleaning crew...how many crabs snails etc...and do starfish work? Also I have cc as sub .

 

[michaeltx]

turbos and cerith is what snails I would get the nassarious may have some trouble with the CC.
I would stay away from the stars they dont do well in the smaller tanks.
as far as how many its hard to say it really depends on how much food is availble in the tank. so you will have to adjust numbers as needed till you have a good balance in the tank.
I wouldnt start with more than 3-5 of each at most and then go from there on adding anymore.
HTH
MIke

 

[usirchchris]

Ok, thanks for the reply mike, I appreciate it

 

[murph]

I would get a small brown brittle star. This is a scavenger star fish and will feed on fish feces and disregarded food. Any other type of star fish is probably not a good idea as was said. Other than that five or six turbo snails.
Personally I don't like hermit crabs. They will eat your snails give the chance so it can be a two step forward one step back kind of thing when included in a cleanup crew.

 

[renogaw]

IDK, i've never seen my hermits go after my snails. i have plenty of extra shells in the tank, but they also don't seem to like astrea shells. Now, if i had cerith snails in the tank maybe i'd have a different tune?

 

[rattler739]

I have actually had my hermits eat astrea snail but not taken there shell.
As far as a clean up crew I would definatly put in snails and hermits.
As for snails: Turbo snails are great but only one or two, Trochus snails are wonderful (best snail ever) but I would not get astreas ever again mine dont do anything. The only reason i got them was because they were labled as trochus. Ill put a pic so you make sure you get what you want

As for hermits: The only ones that i have found that have not killed anything was the scarlet hermits, I had zebra reef hermits and the biggest one killed 2 snails and a smaller zebra hermit But not for the shell either (weird), I have also had tiny blue legged hermits and they would kill my snails and the small zebra hermits. There are other ones out there that would be fine That is just my experience with it.
Trochus snail.

also known as tiger trochus

 

[sflasurfer]

scarlet crabs are notorius for eating snails, if you stay away from them you are generaly ok. IMO a great scavenger and and kind of cool looking star is a serpent star many varieties of color, they say you can have 1 for every 10 gal. I have 5 in my 55gal, there is no teritorial battles and i have very little detritous on my sand bed. Saying this I consider myself a novice so seek advice from more experienced people also. good luck

 

[rattler739]

Originally Posted by sflasurfer
scarlet crabs are notorius for eating snails, if you stay away from them you are generaly ok. IMO a great scavenger and and kind of cool looking star is a serpent star many varieties of color, they say you can have 1 for every 10 gal. I have 5 in my 55gal, there is no teritorial battles and i have very little detritous on my sand bed. Saying this I consider myself a novice so seek advice from more experienced people also. good luck
Usually when people have a problem with hermit crabs they switch to scarlet for the reason that they are so passive and do not attack anything unless they are starving. And on that note all hermit crabs (to my knowledge) are notorius for eating snails because that is were they get there shells from, or if they dont have enough food. But if you provide them with enough extra shells and feed your tank enough that they should have enough to eat, then they most likely will not kill snails.
Most of the more aggressive hermits are opertunistic and will eat a snail if it can.
PS Not trying to be mean or anything but just wanted to set it straight.

Oh yeah, as for the serpent stars that is a great suggestion i have heard they are wonderfull, would be a great addition to a 20g tank (very active)