Quote:
Originally Posted by rockstarnsc83  So just the other day I updated my clean up crew, so right now its
1 scarlet hermit
4 blue leg hermits
2 mexican red leg hermits
1 stocky cerith snail
2 nerite snails
2 nassarius snails
1 trochus snail
1 fighting conch
1 green emerald crab |
I've had no problems with the scarlet hermits (although their beneficial impact uncertain), but you may want to watch the blue leg and red leg hermits to make sure they do not terrorize your snails and irritate your corals. You may collect corals that they have no interest in, but my Zebra hermits love to climb on my Caulestrea furcata and also tromp on Corallimorphs and knock some other small things over. They are interesting to watch, but you may decide later on that they need to be policed. Getting some appropriately sized empty shells will help keep the hermits from going after your snails for their shells.
My choice in snails includes the Cerith, Trochus, and Nassarius.
Slowly building up to a count of 8 Ceriths, 6-8 Trochus, and 4 Nassarius may work well for your tank. The Tonga Fighting Conch is good as well. You may find that the Nerite snails will climb out of your tank or into the
sump compartments, but in your nano with lid I'm not sure if that is even possible.
Lastly, you mentioned that your SB was about 3+" deep? This between the normally recommended
SSB (<1") and
DSB (>4", >6" with courser substrates) depths. It has been studied that these intermediate depths allow diffused nutrients to get trapped since the substrate is not quite deep enough for anoxic zones where bacteria obtain oxygen from
nitrates because of the lack of oxygen in the substrate. This process turns
nitrates a harmless gas. You may not see the effect right away, but 12 to 18 months down the line it may contribute to a buildup of
nitrates in your system. In other words, if you want a deep sand bed to help you process
nitrates, you may want to add an inch. If you do not want a
DSB, you may want to remove all but and inch of substrate.
Some sandbed info:
"Reefkeeping 101 -
Natural Filtration - Part 2" : Scroll down to the section "Getting to the Bottom of Things" Ron Shimek's Deep Sand Beds "An Experimental Comparison of Sandbed and Plenum-Based Systems: Part 2"
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