sand dollars?

[dirk_brijs]

I know they are forbidden to be kept in the States but here in Thailand we have millions of them on the beaches.
I have a few already in my tank but not sure what they eat. They are all in there now since the start 3 months ago and seem to be doing fine.
The question now is would they eat cyano as I currently have a small outbreak so would increasing my sand dollar community work?
I currently only have 5 or so?
Also would increasing my snail community help?
I ordered a few more Turbo snails (10) and could pick up some more nassarius snails from the beaches here (again millions of them here)
my tank is 160gallon and have on top of the 5 sand dollars maybe 10 nassarius, 2 cleaner shrimp and 2 turbos which is actually small as CuC right anyways?

 

[gill again68]

I would first suggest 2 things.
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Check your feedings. Its possible you are feeding more often or more at the time of feeding then your inhabitants can devour.
Check the flow to the areas where the cyano is breaking out. Often lack of flow can contribute to breakouts.
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As far as the sand dollars eating it I have no idea. I dont know what critters will. Remove it manually and try to solve the contributing factor.
Good luck. Any pics of the tank.

 

[fishhugger]

sand dollars cant be kept in the states? When I lived in Washington, there too were millions upon millions of them just sitting on the shore....

 

[dirk_brijs]

i was told that before I actually dont really know but someone on a thread told me that? Maybe certain states?

 

[dirk_brijs]

I do understand that I need to check on avoiding the symptoms instead of treating them but back to my original post I think it is about the size of my CuC dont you think so?
I only feed twice a day very little amounts and about the flow its hard as my sand is fine aragonite so if I would put more flow on it most likely no Cyano but also no sand I guess?

 

[bang guy]

Sand Dollars eat sand bed infauna, worms, snails, crustaceans, etc. Small animals that live in the sand bed. They do not eat Cyanobacter.
Sand Dollars are legal to keep in the US. Unfortunately, a healthy sand Dollar will stay in the sand out of sight so there's not much purpose for keeping them unless you wish to kill a healthy sand bed. in most tanks they will quickly starve, and then you will be able to see them above the sand as they die.

 

[aquaknight]

Quote:
Originally Posted by dirk_brijs http:///forum/thread/382676/sand-dollars#post_3341348
i was told that before I actually dont really know but someone on a thread told me that? Maybe certain states?
Yep. Thankfully this is a state-by-state-issue, and not a blanket-national law. It is legal to own sand dollars in any state, however the harvesting (collecting) of sand dollars is prohibited in probably most states, I know in Florida it is. You will have to check with your own state's wildlife management. In Thailand, I would doubt it. But again as Bang guy stated, they hide in the sand and are never seen, and quickly deplete a sandbed and starve.

 

[dirk_brijs]

wouldnt be the depleting of your sand bed help controlling algea growth in it or on it as all nutrients are out of it?
Maybe they dont eat the bacteria itself but wouldnt it starve the bacteria also if nothing is in it? I have a deep sand bed in my fuge.
Back tothe other question? what is the norm as per numbers on a CuC? I believe mine is small looking at the numbers I posted before or not?

 

[flower]

Low water flow, overfeeding and phosphates ..all these contribute to cyanobacteria. It won't do any good to test for phosphates, you will get a false negitive because it feeds on it. So get something to remove phosphates and after you remove as much cyano by hand as you can do water changes.
I don't know a thing about sand dollars.

 

[geoj]

Yes you can buy more CUC, I like Trochus and Ceriths for the slime algae. How many the answer is enough

Your tank is 3 months old and if you are using RO/DI water and are controlling phosphate, sillicate, and nitrate the algae will go away all by its self.