Best Plants for my set up

[Ahwagirl]

We are currently cycling a 56 gallon. When it's ready and we move our critters from the nano they are in now, I would like to add some greenery to the set-up. We currently have live rock and live sand in there.

The critters I have are:

1 false percula
1 pencil urchin
2 crabs (1 blue banded, 1 red)
2 snails (trocus)

I have had spaghetti algae but the crabs eat it (mostly the blue banded) and the urchin devoured the razor algae I put in there.

I am looking for something low maintenence that will add to the aquascape and not be eating faster than I can put it in.

Oh, and once we are fully going (since we are "upsizing") we'll probably add a sand goby, a coral beauty, maybe a blennie. In about a year we'd like to add a blue or red starfish (not the ones that get huge) once we have enough maturity in the tank.

Thoughts?? :D

[TheH]

It's unusual for hermit crabs to consume chaeto/spaghetti algae. Are you sure that they are in fact doing this?

It is very difficult to grow anything in a tank with something that eats it, I would say impossible except in the largest of tanks. That's why many people use a dedicated refugium to grow macro algaes.

[Mentat]

Keeping macro algae in a tank with herbivores that eat them (your crabs and urchin) is not going to work too good for the algae. If you decide to move the algae consumers out, this article will help get you introduced into macro algae rearing: http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2007-01/sl/index.php.