Petshrimp.com Discussion Forum

If I could find a reliable source for SAE's where they ar enot confused with flying foxes or other similar fish, believe me, they would be in there. If you know of such a source, please, let me know.
As for the crayfish. How much of a threat would they be to Tetra's and juvie sword tails?

DonD wrote:If you know of such a source, please, let me know.

Please keep such requests to the PM area and not the public forum.

As for the crayfish, they won't harm any fish as long as your tank is not bare and has plants and/or hiding places. If you have nothing in your tank and your fish sleep on the ground, then the crayfish might shred a fin or two. However, the fish actually pose a much greater threat to potential baby crayfish. I would not buy the crayfish as just a solution to your algae problem. I would not buy any fish for that purpose either as you will have to take *good* care of your fish or crayfish once the algae are gone or severely decimated.

Believe me, any animal I take in, I care for it well. Ive been in this hobby for a looooooong time, and in that time I have been called a lot of things, but an irresponsible owner has never been one. Anything I add to my tanks is done so with careful thought and planning. Hence my asking these questions.
So, the crayfish are fish safe. The tank is moderately planted as I said, so thats not an issue. Plenty of cover for all concerned. Presuming I get these crayfish and they decimate the algae, what then would I suppliment their diet with? I feed zucchini and wafers to the clown pleco's (who BTW have ZERO interest in hair algae LOL). Would the crayfish also partake or is their something else I would need to do for them?

Hey Don,

I did not mean to imply that you are irresponsible. Just making sure that the crayfish will be fine after their job as algae eaters is done. To that end, the crayfish can be fed with sinking pellets. I have never fed them zucchini, but I don't see a reason why they wouldn't eat that. You can even give them hair algae from other tanks once in a while.

I experimented with SAE's and I'll give them the thumbs down for an invert tank. These eat baby shrimp & crays and grow huge in a short time. The best solution is to reduce the light for a while and use some elbow grease to remove the hair. Lots of water changes to remove the fuel too. Check your water to be sure it is not loaded with nitrates & phosphates. Most places near farms have this as an issue.

Young Cana snails eat anything green. After they mow down the rest of the plants in the tank, they will get the hair algae. My nerites do a fair job as well.

I've been able to salvage much of my javamoss that was coveredin hair algae by moving it to an acidic water tank. For some reason, the hair algae doe not like it.