I've found a website to buy the true SAE, but they're recommending 1 per 5g.
This seems a bit much to me... I've got a 155g planted aquarium, so that'd
be an awful lot of SAE's. Right now, I've got two chinese algae eaters, a
pl*co, some pearl gourami's, rosy barbs, rainbow fish, diamond tetras, a few
mollies, and assorted small tetras. I'd like to get some SAE's and possibly
transfer one of the Chinese guys over to a smaller tank, but do I really
need 31??

I started with one per 15 gallons in my 80 gallon for a total of 5 and that
was plenty. They get big and become food hogs come feeding time. I would
go with 5 of them for a tank your size. I would then add some female flag
fish to handle any thread algae outbreaks you might have.


"Blake" wrote in message
...
I've found a website to buy the true SAE, but they're recommending 1 per
5g.
This seems a bit much to me... I've got a 155g planted aquarium, so that'd
be an awful lot of SAE's. Right now, I've got two chinese algae eaters, a
pl*co, some pearl gourami's, rosy barbs, rainbow fish, diamond tetras, a
few
mollies, and assorted small tetras. I'd like to get some SAE's and
possibly
transfer one of the Chinese guys over to a smaller tank, but do I really
need 31??

"Blake" wrote in message
...
I've found a website to buy the true SAE, but they're recommending 1 per
5g.
This seems a bit much to me... I've got a 155g planted aquarium, so that'd
be an awful lot of SAE's. Right now, I've got two chinese algae eaters, a
pl*co, some pearl gourami's, rosy barbs, rainbow fish, diamond tetras, a
few
mollies, and assorted small tetras. I'd like to get some SAE's and
possibly
transfer one of the Chinese guys over to a smaller tank, but do I really
need 31??



I have 5 in my 77g heavily planted tank along with 4 Otto's and some
livebearers and one large pleco. They do a reasonable job of keeping the
algae under control. The SAE's are only good when they are small. They
quickly adapt to flake food and won't touch the algae.

Rick

In my 125 i have

8 SAE - they do ok... i think they are to used to being fed now though..
after about a month of being algaeless..
6 albino bristle nose plecos - they werent my choice, they came free with
the saes *2 each time they reshipped due to death*
estimated 20 ghost shrimp - they are always eating algae / dead leaves /
dead snails
100's of malasian snails and some rams horn that im trying to get rid of.
and 1 big *4 inches and hes only 2 months old* common pleco - as soon as he
starts to eat leaves and i can catch him - hes out..
Livebearers, lots of them platy's..

I bought an inline uv steralizer, that seemed to help the algae quite a bit,
if thats all you want them for.

Hope that helps - i have all that ans still have small small amounts of
algae. *however i welcome small algae since 50% of the population eats it -
free food*

Good Luck!

Dustin


"Blake" wrote in message
...
I've found a website to buy the true SAE, but they're recommending 1 per
5g.
This seems a bit much to me... I've got a 155g planted aquarium, so that'd
be an awful lot of SAE's. Right now, I've got two chinese algae eaters, a
pl*co, some pearl gourami's, rosy barbs, rainbow fish, diamond tetras, a
few
mollies, and assorted small tetras. I'd like to get some SAE's and
possibly
transfer one of the Chinese guys over to a smaller tank, but do I really
need 31??

feed your fish pellet food and the sae's mouth is physically too small to
eat the food...and thus they are forced to continue to eat algae

"Rick" wrote in message
a...

"Blake" wrote in message
...
I've found a website to buy the true SAE, but they're recommending 1 per
5g.
This seems a bit much to me... I've got a 155g planted aquarium, so
that'd
be an awful lot of SAE's. Right now, I've got two chinese algae eaters,
a
pl*co, some pearl gourami's, rosy barbs, rainbow fish, diamond tetras, a
few
mollies, and assorted small tetras. I'd like to get some SAE's and
possibly
transfer one of the Chinese guys over to a smaller tank, but do I really
need 31??



I have 5 in my 77g heavily planted tank along with 4 Otto's and some
livebearers and one large pleco. They do a reasonable job of keeping the
algae under control. The SAE's are only good when they are small. They
quickly adapt to flake food and won't touch the algae.

Rick

want to get rid of the snails? get a puffer

"DWS" wrote in message
...
In my 125 i have

8 SAE - they do ok... i think they are to used to being fed now though..
after about a month of being algaeless..
6 albino bristle nose plecos - they werent my choice, they came free with
the saes *2 each time they reshipped due to death*
estimated 20 ghost shrimp - they are always eating algae / dead leaves /
dead snails
100's of malasian snails and some rams horn that im trying to get rid of.
and 1 big *4 inches and hes only 2 months old* common pleco - as soon as
he
starts to eat leaves and i can catch him - hes out..
Livebearers, lots of them platy's..

I bought an inline uv steralizer, that seemed to help the algae quite a
bit,
if thats all you want them for.

Hope that helps - i have all that ans still have small small amounts of
algae. *however i welcome small algae since 50% of the population eats
it -
free food*

Good Luck!

Dustin


"Blake" wrote in message
...
I've found a website to buy the true SAE, but they're recommending 1 per
5g.
This seems a bit much to me... I've got a 155g planted aquarium, so
that'd
be an awful lot of SAE's. Right now, I've got two chinese algae eaters,
a
pl*co, some pearl gourami's, rosy barbs, rainbow fish, diamond tetras, a
few
mollies, and assorted small tetras. I'd like to get some SAE's and
possibly
transfer one of the Chinese guys over to a smaller tank, but do I really
need 31??

In article ink.net,
"Christopher" writes:

feed your fish pellet food and the sae's mouth is physically too small to
eat the food...and thus they are forced to continue to eat algae

My SAEs like to graze on both sinking and floating pellets. They seem to hover
so that the pellet is balanced in front of them and will just rasp at the
surface. I guess it's just a matter of time for the pellets to soften enough
for them to start pulling off edible material.


Erica
http://members.aol.com/_ht_a/mitoem/mitoem/index.htm

In article ink.net,
"Christopher" writes:


want to get rid of the snails? get a puffer


I wouldn't really recommend a puffer for Dustin's tank -- freshwater puffers
can be very agressive and may try to eat other community fish. I suspect
they'd also go for the shrimp.

Also, someone on this (or the r.a.f.misc) group suggested that MTS's aren't
good for puffers as their shells are much harder than other breeds of snails
and can damage puffer teeth. Don't know if this is true, but it would be worth
looking into for anyone considerign puffers to control an MTS population.


Erica
http://members.aol.com/_ht_a/mitoem/mitoem/index.htm

On Sat, 19 Apr 2003 15:32:52 GMT, "Rick" wrote:

livebearers and one large pleco. They do a reasonable job of keeping the
algae under control. The SAE's are only good when they are small. They
quickly adapt to flake food and won't touch the algae.

My SAEs are cigar sized, and while they definitely are pigs for the
flake food, they keep the tank 100% clear of hair algae and BBA. For
a while I had my 75g and 46g tanks linked together on the same
filtration system. The 75g has SAEs, the 46g did not. After less
than a month, lots of BBA was present in the 46g. I moved the
infested plants over to the 75g, and the SAEs cleaned the plants
within 2 days.

I definitely don't starve them (they are in a tank with always-hungry
rainbowfish that I overfeed), but they clean BBA as good as the day I
got them.


Chuck Gadd
http://www.csd.net/~cgadd/aqua