# Cleaners for planted tanks



## Johnnyfishtanks (Apr 21, 2010)

so i have a 180 gallon tank that im gonna start as a community tank.
what is the best cleaners for algae and stuff and how many should i get ?


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## eternity302 (Apr 22, 2010)

A small group of oto cats~! At least that's what I prefer, I have a crew of 8 in my tank and kinda schools together spot to spots~


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## gklaw (May 31, 2010)

BNP hands down ! 6?


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## CRS Fan (Apr 21, 2010)

Amano shrimp are also very effective as an algae control team. I suggest maybe 40 of them. They can also be housed with Ottos and BNP's without any problems.

Best regards,

Stuart


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## discuspaul (Jul 2, 2010)

All good suggestions above.
You might consider Siamese Algae Eaters. I have those with Amano shrimp & they do a good job. Oto cats have not performed too well for me - they only seem to like certain types of algae - e.g. they won't touch hair/thread algae.


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## Kitsune (Jul 17, 2010)

Siamese algae eaters are ok, but I've found that they prefer the fish food that I feed the other guys, so they are SUPER FAT and don't do as good a job of cleaning the tank as people make it sound. 

Plus they are pretty aggressive (amongst themselves). I would go with the Oto's, rather than the SAE..., especially in a community tank.


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## InfraredDream (Jun 24, 2010)

Nerite snails as well as ramshorn if you consider snails. I am impressed with how much work a single sebra snail did in a short week!


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## wsl (Apr 21, 2010)

Yeah, I agree with kitsune about SAE. I got a single one to get rid of some bba, but it prefers to eat fish food, and it's not discriminating about it, so mine has gotten nice and fat. 

For algae that grows on the side of the glass (green spot algae, green dust algae), nerite snails are definitely your best bet. You can actually see the marks where they scrape the algae off the glass.

Amano shrimp and even other dwarf shrimp (e.g. cherries) do a good job of cleaning as well, but may not be a viable option depending on the fish you're planning to keep. 

My otos haven't really visibly impacted algae levels in my tank as far as I can see, but they're always sucking stuff off of the glass and off the plants, and they don't seem hungry so I assume they're doing their job.


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## discuspaul (Jul 2, 2010)

*Re: My post above*

I have 6 SAE's in my planted discus tank, who don't/won't compete with the discus for food, and the discus won't allow much food to reach anywhere near the bottom of the tank in any event. 
So, my SAE's are doing their job, are not fat, and are not aggressive amongst themselves at all. I do know that some people have had the problems kitsune describes, with flying foxes, which look very similar to SAE's and are often sold as such, and with Chinese Algae Eaters, which can get quite large and aggressive, and also look somewhat like SAE's as youngsters.

As for Otos, I've had them as well, and IME they don't do the job they're cracked up to do, (mine sure didn't), AND they are known at times to add Discus' slime coats to their menu of preferred foods, (which mine did), so I have no cause to recommend them. That's my .02


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## Rastapus (Apr 21, 2010)

Agreed with everything above. A mixture if maintenance fish etc. is your best bet. Different algae eaters tend to target different algae. SAE are great for beard algae where Otos and snails are great for brown diatoms. Shrimp are overall great scavengers. Focus on a maintenance crew rather then one species. SAE are known for pigging out on food if they are in a quiet community tank. Feeding must be kept to a minimum in that case to encourage them to do their job they have been hired to do.


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## Johnnyfishtanks (Apr 21, 2010)

sweet thanks everybody i don't think i can do shrimp with all the fish i plan on getting . my tank gonna be crawling with fish soon


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## discuspaul (Jul 2, 2010)

Agree 100% with rastapus !


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## Ursus sapien (Apr 21, 2010)

^^^likewise, a mix of algae eating species gives best control, and guards against break-outs of new types of algae. 

I know what's been said about Siamese algae eaters, but the young ones I got from April have been doing a killer job on the black beard algae in my corydoras tank.


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## Johnnyfishtanks (Apr 21, 2010)

i think im gonna go with a bunch of different ones. im gonna have alot of space


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## ncutler (Apr 26, 2010)

Don't forget about American flag fish. I've got 6 that do a lot more than my SAE or otos or Amano.

From my experience, each type enjoys different algae. Otos and BN like 2D green algae, SAEs like 3D along with Amano and Flag fish. and you always get individual differences between algae eaters, so hence the reason to get a variety.


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## Johnnyfishtanks (Apr 21, 2010)

so i got 6 bronze cory what else should i get


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## Ursus sapien (Apr 21, 2010)

corys are excellent janitors, also they keep things stired up up so that more mulm gets into the filter, but they're not going to help with algae. If you have corys, can I assume it's a soft to neutral water set-up? That Leaves out the flag fish, but most everything else mentioned in the thread should work.


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