JerryJ January 18, 2011 Share January 18, 2011 Hi, I'm starting up my first FOWLR tank (29 gallon). The live rock's been in there for a couple of weeks and I'll be adding the algae cleanup crew shortly. One of my rocks has a couple of feather dusters. One's about 1/4 inch in diameter (white arms) and the other is orange and so small it's almost invisible. The store I go to recommends an algae eating pack for a 30 gallon tank that includes an emerald crab and a Sally Lightfoot crab. Will these crabs kill my feather dusters? I'm trying to target feed the dusters with phytoplankton...don't know how long I can keep them alive but I'd like to try. Thanks... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Coral Hind January 18, 2011 Share January 18, 2011 I'm sure if there was no other food in the tank they might go after the feather dusters. What fish are you planning to keep? Depending on what your stock list is the worms may be a meal to them. I don't think you need to target feed the feather dusters. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JerryJ January 18, 2011 Author Share January 18, 2011 I want to put "easy" fish in there...e.g., gobies, firefish, cardinal, maybe clownfish. My understanding is that these are mostly compatible with inverts. But I know there are no hard and fast rules here! Thanks for the quick response! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chad January 18, 2011 Share January 18, 2011 Welcome to WAMAS!! +1 to what Coral Hind said... As a general rule, crabs are individually opportunistic... meaning that the answer is maybe, under the right circumstances, with the right crab... Just keep an eye on the food availability, you may need to add some if there isn't much. I think the sally lightfoot is more likely than the others you mentioned to do the deed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BowieReefer84 January 18, 2011 Share January 18, 2011 I want to put "easy" fish in there...e.g., gobies, firefish, cardinal, maybe clownfish. My understanding is that these are mostly compatible with inverts. But I know there are no hard and fast rules here! Thanks for the quick response! fyi gobies and firefish jump. Make sure you get a top. And, do not target feed the feather dusters phyto. You are goin to create algae problems more than anything else. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WaterDog January 18, 2011 Share January 18, 2011 I want to put "easy" fish in there...e.g., gobies, firefish, cardinal, maybe clownfish. My understanding is that these are mostly compatible with inverts. As others have said, the crabs are opportunistic and may feed on the feather dusters. In my opinion, as Chad said, is that the sally lightfoot is more of a threat. It may also be a threat to some of the smaller/slower fish. However, the feather dusters I have (may not be the same kind) seem to reproduce really quickly, so you may want something that eats them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JerryJ January 18, 2011 Author Share January 18, 2011 BowieReefer84, Interesting about the algae bloom...But I'm just using a few drops a day of PhytoFeast, squirted right at the dusters. I wouldn't think that would be enough to cause algae problems, or am I wrong? The bottle says to use 1 to 5 drops per gallon, but I don't intend to saturate the whole tank with PhytoFeast just to feed a couple of nearly-microscopic tubeworms. This may be a moot topic...squirting the food on the dusters without making them retract takes some patience, so I will probably quit when I get tired of it. It's fun now, but I'm sure I'll get bored with it soon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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