We all know that a typical recommendation to help get rid of bubble algae is to get an emerald crab. I've got them in the past and, frankly, they never seemed to do all that much. I guess it's possible that they helped and I just never really noticed. I've never had much of an issue with any type of bubble algae but I did notice some red valonia bubble algae in my frag tank and thought "What the heck?" and bought an emerald crab. I slowly acclimated it to the tank and introduced it a few weeks ago never to see it again. That's been my experience, you might see them once in a great while and then they're gone.
For some reason my GSP all closed up a few days ago. With it all retraced I saw a patch of red valonia and as I went to manually remove it, I noticed the emerald crab was sitting there among it. Lo and behold, I watched him grab one of the little red bubbles and chomp it all away. Over the course of an hour or two, it ate most of the red valonia is that spot. Just hanging out and munching away. I was very pleased and I'm now confident that emerald crabs are, in fact, a good potential solution (at least for red bubble algae). The reason I'm posting this is that I've never seen one actually doing what we say they do. I'm sure a lot depends on the individual crab but this one has already earned his spot in my tank by putting in work.
For some reason my GSP all closed up a few days ago. With it all retraced I saw a patch of red valonia and as I went to manually remove it, I noticed the emerald crab was sitting there among it. Lo and behold, I watched him grab one of the little red bubbles and chomp it all away. Over the course of an hour or two, it ate most of the red valonia is that spot. Just hanging out and munching away. I was very pleased and I'm now confident that emerald crabs are, in fact, a good potential solution (at least for red bubble algae). The reason I'm posting this is that I've never seen one actually doing what we say they do. I'm sure a lot depends on the individual crab but this one has already earned his spot in my tank by putting in work.
