Anyone with experience with seahares, which species works best for algae cleanup in a frag tank? And will they clean frags without damaging the frags? Or are hermits still the best CUC at this job? Asking for a friend.... 
Sea hare opinion wanted
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What kind is he
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Dolabella sea hare for sure. He’s awesome. And fun to watch!
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The only concern with Sea Hares is them inking. I've never had mine do that that I know of. He's in a 4x2x1' tank with two clowns, two springer damsels, a file fish, 7 peppermint shrimp, and a yellow tang and CUC. Everyone just leaves him alone.
Haha...they’re smart! He’s like the skunk of the tank I guess
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It's a defense mechanism, similar to octopi and squid and other cepholopods.
Yes, same as a skunk. They spray if they feel threatened, these ink you. Lol.
I would go with snails for frag tanks unless you have an algae forest in the tank. That way you won’t have to worry about running out of algae and in the event snails die, they won’t nuke your tank
Good luck! I googled it to see what it was and the websites show them as wait listed. Maybe one of the lfs have them.My daughter loves sea hares and is trying to convince me to get one
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Which is exactly why I'm giving mine to @Totes hopefully tomorrow.
Fwiw,
In the Gulf they get quite large, like ~8-10 inches. When you’re in the water with them they seem even bigger. My wife freaked out when some swam past us in turtle grass beds at Cape San Blas.
I tend to stay away from considering nudibranch’s because they all tend to have very specific feeding requirements. Even Sea Hares, as mentioned. As a result, most do not do well long term.
In the Gulf they get quite large, like ~8-10 inches. When you’re in the water with them they seem even bigger. My wife freaked out when some swam past us in turtle grass beds at Cape San Blas.
I tend to stay away from considering nudibranch’s because they all tend to have very specific feeding requirements. Even Sea Hares, as mentioned. As a result, most do not do well long term.
That's great use of the club to pass something like this from one to another to keep it alive and help everybody along the way. I wouldn't mind having one for a time in my BioCube, which is too small for tangs and various other algae eaters.
hmm, maybe we could get a group of algae eaters to get going around the club for supporting members. There are a lot of variables tho.
@sharis100 - we had one for a while, it eventually committed suicide on a pump head.
After all the horror stories I kept hearing about them inking, poisoning the tank etc - I was amazed that I saw zero negative affect - other than our super fun to watch sea hare was dead.
He had wrapped himself around a power head and I think enough of him got in the slots that he got stuck. I found him one morning all shriveled up and wrapped tight around the outside of the powerhead - he did not get chopped up so that may have saved us from a disaster and he was not there the night before when we went to bed. From a "poisoning the tank" perspective I would not consider it any more dangerous than a wandering BTA or cucumbers.
I was not running carbon or anything special on the tank. He was in a 120 gallon with a 40b sump and the sea hare was about 3" long. He never bothered anything and nothing ever took a second look at him.
They will TEAR THROUGH some algae.
I bought our's from pure reef - and they stated when I bought them that they would be happy to have him back if my tanks got to clean to support him.
After all the horror stories I kept hearing about them inking, poisoning the tank etc - I was amazed that I saw zero negative affect - other than our super fun to watch sea hare was dead.
He had wrapped himself around a power head and I think enough of him got in the slots that he got stuck. I found him one morning all shriveled up and wrapped tight around the outside of the powerhead - he did not get chopped up so that may have saved us from a disaster and he was not there the night before when we went to bed. From a "poisoning the tank" perspective I would not consider it any more dangerous than a wandering BTA or cucumbers.
I was not running carbon or anything special on the tank. He was in a 120 gallon with a 40b sump and the sea hare was about 3" long. He never bothered anything and nothing ever took a second look at him.
They will TEAR THROUGH some algae.
I bought our's from pure reef - and they stated when I bought them that they would be happy to have him back if my tanks got to clean to support him.
Good to hear they will take livestock back. To me that is a sign of a quality business ethic, especially when dealing with living things.
