Looking to add some inverts to my tanks. Thinking either an urchin or starfish. I haven't started my reef yet but I know in the future I will be adding some zoas and polyps. What are some easy to maintain inverts that are also reef safe?
Reef Safe Invertebrates?
- Thread starter kiwi210
- Start date
What size is the tank? I suggest against any type of starfish as there very very hard to keep and are near the top for being hard to keep.
Cleaner shrimp are normally a good thing to have. Keeps your corals and fish clean and I never had an issue with him eating corals.
Cleaner shrimp are normally a good thing to have. Keeps your corals and fish clean and I never had an issue with him eating corals.
If this is the same 10gal tank from your other thread, the red slime issue needs attention before anything else ornamental goes in the tank and you may need to add a clean-up crew if there isn't one (wasn't clear what the stocking was). Echinoderms like sea urchins and sea stars are some of the more fragile inverts in terms of their sensitivity to water parameters and need a mature, well-established tank. A 10gal is really too small for any of them except for Asterina stars, which may or may not be something you want.
xXLeafeonXx
Fish Fanatic
Tuxedo urchins are good they eat coraline algae tho.
Puffer_Nat
Mostly New Member
kiwi210 said:
If you do opt for cleaner shrimp they prefer to be in groups rather than on their own so ideally go for more than one
How many to stock depends on the species.
- Peppermints: groups.
- Skunks: one or a pair at most to be safe in all but large tanks since they will pair and then sometimes kill other individuals. I can't remember offhand whether the same behavior pattern exists with blood/fire shrimp.
- Coral banded/boxers (not in the Lysmata genus but often sold as "cleaners" and will clean fish under the right conditions): should be kept singly even in a pretty big tank unless purchased as a mated pair.
Puffer_Nat
Mostly New Member
My bad, when I hear people talk of cleaner shrimps I always assume they mean scarlet cleaners (Lysmata amboinensis) which I would still advise keeping at least a pair. I've found that individually/pairs they tend to spend most of their time scared and hiding whereas in larger groups they thrive and I've never had problems with them killing each other 
The bigger the space, the less risk there will be of that sort of thing. However, for smaller space cases, I've even heard of a couple cases of L. amboinensis (scarlet/skunk) taking out different shrimp species when a big enough size disparity was present between the two. It's obviously not the norm, but not impossible when the animals are too densely packed.
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