SeaFish Posted February 28, 2003 Share Posted February 28, 2003 which urchins stays small and is reef safe? i heard most eat coraline algae. are they any that dont. also i need one that stays real small. i have hair algae and i was told to get an urchin. i try to do a search, but do to time constraint, i couldnt be very through with the search. please forgive the inconvience. but anyone out there keep an urchin that is reef safe and small enough for a 20g? preferrably as small as possible. thanks you Link to comment
cjm033 Posted February 28, 2003 Share Posted February 28, 2003 i think tuxedos are reef safe upto a point. i think abs had one in his tanks for a little bit untill it out grew it and was startn to cause trouble,Chris Link to comment
Crakeur Posted February 28, 2003 Share Posted February 28, 2003 urchin spines +corals = death. No matter what size, I cannot see putting a ball of needles into a coral field and not getting damage. Link to comment
tinyreef Posted February 28, 2003 Share Posted February 28, 2003 stupid @#%*$# urchins! you want urchins? i'll give you urchins! the spines aren't so much the issue rather that they bowl thing over and hide during the day. i would've put up with mine eating my out of coralline and knocking over my frags as long as i could see it during the day (they are kewl! ). i finally banished it to the sump after breaking off a couple of spines prying it off my LR. Link to comment
Satchmo Posted February 28, 2003 Share Posted February 28, 2003 I have a tuxedo in my 46. The thing's about plum-size and I've had no problems so far. He's out during the day too, for the most part. Doesn't really put a dent in the coralline, and I've read that they can actually help it to spread. I don't have any sensative corals in this tank, otherwise I would reconsider. He goes where he wants to go, with little regard for what's in his way. BTW- some may remember a previous post about this guy. He's still wearing the small mat of GSP he draped himself with about a month ago. I haven't had the heart to take it away. Link to comment
JPF Posted February 28, 2003 Share Posted February 28, 2003 Last spring an eraser sized urchin crawled out of my LR. Since then it has grown to about the size of a baseball. I run a soft coral tank and dont see any damage except to my fingers on occasion. The urchin is black and spiney. My corraline seems plentiful. In my sons tank is a Hawaiian urchin. It has pretty rose spines that are thick like a pencil. It hides a bit but is cool. Once in a while they knock things over but not too often. When they kick the bucket I will get a replacement. Anyone know how long they live? Link to comment
Mnesarchus Posted March 1, 2003 Share Posted March 1, 2003 Dont get an Urchin. I had a longspine black in my 10g for a few months, he quadroopled in size easily. He ate corraline. His poop was worse to clean up than algae. They knocked over rocks and corals. He ate a Xenia frag. Dont get an urchin. Link to comment
CRG Posted March 1, 2003 Share Posted March 1, 2003 I have two black spiny urchins that came as hitchhikers on my Gulf-View LR and they have increased in size dramatically over the past couple of months. I suppose I will have to take one or both to the LFS for credit once they start causing trouble : Link to comment
SeaFish Posted March 1, 2003 Author Share Posted March 1, 2003 wow, thanks guys and gals. i think i willl stay away from urchins then. thank you all for all your imputs. saved me a lot of trouble since i was thinking about getting one. thank you all...your all my life savers. =) Link to comment
Dave ESPI Posted March 1, 2003 Share Posted March 1, 2003 LOL SEA URCHIN.. LOL not in a nano. Bad idea. if you MUST have one, pencil urchins are slow growers as well as the pink caribbean ones they tend to be a bit more nimble. Link to comment
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