Shrimp/other CUC question

[justanotherfishhead]

I got a peppermint shrimp about a month ago and she seems to be doing okay, but I have a question. I know you're not supposed to overfeed, so I feed just enough so my fish get all the food before it goes to the bottom, maybe once in a while a piece makes it down there. Will my shrimp find enough to eat, or should I hand feed her something sometimes? I had one aptaisia so there may be others for her to eat that are too small to see (the only one I saw was too big for her to eat so I had to kill it).

Also I think my sand still looks dirty. I know I need a few more nassarius, but other than that what can I do? My new starry blenny seems to leave so much green poop all over the place, is there anything that will help with that?

 

[valasaraptor]

what all CUC do u have? so far?

 

[justanotherfishhead]

I have one turbo snail, 4 tongan nassarius (going to get 6 more when I can), one peppermint shrimp, and a starry blenny. The regular algae seems to be under control with the turbo and blenny, but I have one rock that grows hair algae like crazy. I am going to try brushing it off soon and hopefully the blenny will eat it as it grows back. It's a hassle to clean because I have other rocks resting on that rock and have to pretty much disassemble half the tank.

 

[valasaraptor]

the fish and snail wont fix the problem just mask it,you need to find the reason the algae is growing not just cover it up.and you should really have a good diversity of snails and or hermits to clean each one does a specific job

 

[justanotherfishhead]

When I got the rock from the LFS there was some hair algae on it, and that's the only rock that has it. Should I get rid of it? Nitrates are near 0, phospate is also zero (I know that test doesn't mean anything because the algae is absorbing it)

Is there any type of CUC that will eat blenny poop? I'm guessing probably not...

I will try to find a few different snails, my LFS seems to only carry turbo and nass.

 

[SarahSmile]

yeah, sand can look that way, that's why I went with black and white this time, so hard to keep just the white/beige looking, well, white and beige.
You should pull off as much of the hair algae as possible and get it out of the tank. Is this rock close to the lights? are you using tap water?
I'd say add some ceriths and asteras and a couple blue legged crabs. Quick crews on reefcleaners.org are cheap and have free shipping, just pick up the package for a small tank or you may have too many snails, like the 20 gallon option. Then grab some blue legged snails at a local store.

 

[justanotherfishhead]

Thanks Sarah, I will order the quick crew for 20gal. That's awesome that they do free shipping, not a bad deal! Hopefully that will help my sand. About the hair algae, maybe I'll just toss the entire rock. It's not that big of a rock and I shouldn't have bought it anyway when I saw the algae on it at the store. The rock is at least mid-tank so its pretty close to the lights, so maybe I could just clean it off then place it under some other rocks? I started the tank with tap water before I knew better, but I've done I think 4 or 5 water changes since then and a couple were changing at least 40% of the water.

 

[SarahSmile]

I know it, what a deal right? Plus sometimes they have a 5 dollar off coupon code on their site too. Make sure to choose the right shipping method for free quick crew shipping, it tells you which to choose. Maybe try taking the rock out and scrubbing it with a toothbrush in some old tank water. I hate to see a rock pitched. I had one that was just always friggin' covered with hair algae, I got a blue legged crab and he helped but I think it was tap water/too close to lights. When I switched tanks I toothbrushed the rock and put it on the bottom of my new tank and, badda bing, no hair algae.
Sounds like you are on the right track to getting rid of tap water crud

 

[BL1]

Phosphates can/will leach into your rocks. So chances are that since it had algae on it at the LFS, that they leached into the rock as well. That means if you keep your numbers good, you'll still see algae on that rock until the algae uses up all the phosphates that were soaked into it.
I would keep the rock personally, the algae will go away eventually.

 

[Northstar24]

I'd say keep the rock as well, just keep an eye on the hair algae so it doesn't spread

 

[justanotherfishhead]

Yeah, I think I'll clean the rock and put it where the light doesn't hit it at all.

About my peppermint shrimp, do I need to worry about her getting enough to eat? Make sure a few pieces make it to the bottom? Or are they like snails just finding whatever is there to eat?