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View Full Version : How many crabs in your CUC?


OneReef
01/15/2014, 03:03 PM
Just curious how many crabs people are using for CUC? Can you list how many crabs and your aquarium size? You can list snails if you wish, but I am mainly interested in crab numbers. I looked at the suggested table on LiveAquaria and it seems really high. I have a 120g and currently have like 10 crabs. They suggest for 125g something like 200+ crabs of various types. Seems like a lot to me, but I do have some minor hair algae I'd like help with.

jdaniels175
01/15/2014, 03:12 PM
0 in my 50 gal. My thinking is to only get crabs if you like them or for very specific reasons, like algae control via Emerald crabs. I can't see having 200 crabs in a 125. must be a new tank style, crab dominate. IMHO most "Clean up crews" have way to many animals anyway.

thegrun
01/15/2014, 03:19 PM
50 gallon mixed reef, 0 crabs, 4 small hermit crabs

TheGodParticle
01/15/2014, 03:26 PM
I actually agree with the above poster. I have 0 crabs and snails in my 150. I use 2 fighting conch and some various shrimp (Coral banded, cleaner shrimp, fire shrimp) it's of my personal belief that havibg a large CUC can actually do a lot more harm than good. I see these threads all the time, people buy 200+ snails and crabs for CUC and in a month or two can't figure out why their nitrates are sky high and have algae everywhere. The clean-up crews compete and most of the time there is mass die off of the CUC.... ends up doing more harm than good. Not to say a small CUC isn't beneficial, I just wouldn't go overboard.

mayjong
01/15/2014, 03:29 PM
0 crabs

tkeracer619
01/15/2014, 03:32 PM
Crabs? No thanks, I have enough problems.

Lateralus
01/15/2014, 03:37 PM
In my 120 I have 30ish blue legs, most are very small and a couple ornimentals. For snails I have 5 astreas, 2 turbos, 2 nassarius and a tiger conch. Tbh I don't think you need to look past the worms, pods and everything else that comes on live rock for your cuc. I feel they are much more efficient than any hermit or snail you can buy and will ebb and flow as needed.

davocean
01/15/2014, 03:57 PM
I've had 0 crabs for a long time, don't like them, they pick at snails.
I just recently got a hermie by accident that was in some rubble, figured eh, my GF likes him, one won't be a big deal, right??
So my GF yells to me she is watching that hermit pull a snail off the glass panel, so not a dead snail, and there was plenty of rubble/shells.
Emerald crabs I will get once in a while, and that is only temporary to remove any valonia, because when they get big they knock things over.
Fortunately they are usually fairly easy to catch.
Acro/commensal crabs are awesome though if you score any hitching on any sps, those are wonderful.

cloak
01/15/2014, 04:18 PM
No crabs, (emerald, lightfoot, etc) but a ratio of about one scarlet hermit to every 25-30 gallons of water has always served me well.

Palting
01/15/2014, 04:21 PM
IMO, the actual number of CUC being sold is way too high. They end up dying slowly and feeding themselves until a balance is achieved.

150 gallon mixed reef running almost 4 years, 3 hermit blue leg crabs, 2 red leg, 1 skunk shrimp, maybe 2 surviving snails. Other than brittle stars and assorted critters numbering in the multitude living in the substrate and the rocks, that's it for my CUC. No algae problems at all. The answer to algae problem IMO is not CUC, but correction of the underlying problem causing the algae outbreak.

OneReef
01/15/2014, 06:06 PM
Here is the chart I referenced on LiveAquaria. Just seems way out of wack.

http://i43.photobucket.com/albums/e370/topgun121/CUCchart_zps520d4be5.jpg

fermentedhiker
01/15/2014, 06:26 PM
Reefcleaners recommends 29 assorted hermits for a 120. A little more reasonable, but still seems like a lot.

tkeracer619
01/15/2014, 06:39 PM
Why wouldn't they recommend more then you should have?

They sell more, they die off polluting the tank, they sell you more, rinse, repeat.

raybyrne67
01/15/2014, 06:43 PM
75gal mixed reef cuc, 2 emerald crabs, 3 turbo, 5 nassarias, 1 tiger conch, 1 blood red cleaner shrimp.

james30ct
01/15/2014, 07:15 PM
I have 2 hermits that were moved to the sump.

NTP66
01/15/2014, 07:53 PM
3, because the others weren't smart enough to hide while the trigger was awake. :)

DLANDINO
01/15/2014, 09:20 PM
I have two blue leg hermits and one emerald crab. I don't keep many hermits because I don't like replacing my snail population often.

slgcmg
01/15/2014, 11:31 PM
I have about 40 in a 180. Wish I cold keep snails instead but my Melanurus loves the taste of those.

robotman
01/16/2014, 02:40 AM
like 4 scarlett hermits, 4 blue knuckle, had 4 emeralds but I cant find them anymore, 1 hitchhiker crab

barjam
01/16/2014, 06:46 AM
I had 10 hermits in my 120 gallon. I removed them and started to see all sorts of tiny snails (collonista & and a mini limpet type) and starfish pop up. Snails seem fairly useless against the types of algae that grow in my tank anyhow. 30 new astrea snails did more in one day than the 10 crabs they replaced did the entire time they were there.

So zero for me.

Spyderturbo007
01/16/2014, 07:15 AM
I have 3 Hermit Crabs in my 55g.

NJKayakAngler
01/16/2014, 07:32 AM
I only keep about 5 micro blue legs in my 60 gallon have had to many problems with them tearing stuff apart

sirreal63
01/16/2014, 08:40 AM
No crabs of any kind since 2007 and i don't miss them one bit.

mayjong
01/17/2014, 04:08 PM
that la recommendation list is INSANE

you could nuke a whole tank with that many inverts. you would almost certainly have mass casualties....

rlm2005
01/17/2014, 05:12 PM
I have 5 hermits. No other crabs but I plan on adding a couple of pom poms in the future.

arnoldrew
01/17/2014, 05:57 PM
I've got about 6 hermits in my 90 gallon.

skidoctor
01/17/2014, 10:02 PM
I can't even count how many I have in my DT (let alone my fuge), along with all sorts of snails, shrimps, queen conch, serpent stars.... I've had the majority for years, and I'm always seeing snail egg tracks so I guess snails and crabs are spawning somewhere. There are always fights and deaths, every once in a while I'll see a blue legged astrea hermit, my melanarus picks at some... Never had a spot of any kind of algae ever.

rldcpa
01/17/2014, 10:05 PM
I have 2 reef safe hermits, 3 shrimp and around 20 snails in my 240. I could use some more.

So far no problems from the shrimp or hermits against the corals and clam.

bradleybradley
01/17/2014, 11:34 PM
I've got 4 hermits in my 65. I bought two and then two more snuck in with a Reefcleaners order.

lrs183
01/18/2014, 12:06 AM
0 crabs in my tank. Heard too many horror stories of coral eaters and snail killers. Not to mention hermits may even kill each other for a shell.

slowjazz
01/18/2014, 10:25 AM
Here is the chart I referenced on LiveAquaria. Just seems way out of wack.

http://i43.photobucket.com/albums/e370/topgun121/CUCchart_zps520d4be5.jpg

yea.. seems like they are drawing up business for themselves :) I have one hermit crab and he still picks off snails now and then. (even tho he is supposed to leave the little ones alone due to their small shell size)
He gets plenty of food, so it is not a food issue.

If you are going to get snails, then your better off without crabs.
A good sand clean could be a goby, sand star or even a tiger cuc. (did not catch your tank size, if small then these guys will prob. starve as they clean sand fast) Snails are good for glass.
people hate - fire worms, but they do eat a lot of junk in the sand and limit themselves.

Spyderturbo007
01/20/2014, 06:50 AM
They recommend 50 hermit crabs for a 55g tank? That's absolutely insane and I find it irresponsible for them to recommend so many. 90% of them would starve to death and the other 10% would kill most of the 50 snails they say you should put in a 55g tank.

Dirtbags. :mad:

johnike
01/20/2014, 07:11 AM
1 acro crab.
Had a huge Emerald, but haven't seen it in a while.

LobsterOfJustice
01/20/2014, 08:06 AM
Only three kinds of crabs are allowed in my tanks: Scarlet Reef Hermits, Porcelain Crabs, and Acro Crabs. Out of that list, only the Scarlets would be considered part of the cleanup crew. And even then, I only would have a few (maybe 1 per 20 gallons).