Sea Hare for rent

[spikehs]

I picked up a sea hare fron nate @ big als, this thing has done an AMAZING job at eating the hair algae in my tank. The rocks were completley covered, with long hair algae, a couple of weeks later and the rocks are clean. He did make kind of a mess of the sand bed, but other than that I can't compain. I figre he'll be out of hair algae to eat in a couple of weeks, so if anyone wants to "borrow" him untill their algae is gone he'll be up rent. You can take him for free (temporarily), but frags are always accepted

[danny zubot]

Forgive my ignorance but I've never heard of a sea hare before. Can you explain because if its as good as you make it out to be I may need it for my tank soon.

[spikehs]

it looks like a pretty big (about 3 inches in diameter and pretty round) and very ugly slug. Go to reef central and do a search, that is where I heard about them.

[danny zubot]

Will do, Thanks!

[Delphinus]

Does yours take algae pellets or wafers yet Sean?

[EmilyB]

Have you heard of them doing that Tony ?

From what I've heard, they eat hair algae only.....and then die.

[spikehs]

haven't tried that... but i did a bit of reading and they take them readily... supposedly anways.

[Delphinus]

I've heard you can feed them pellets or wafers, if you run out of hair algae.

I've got a plethora of spirulina pellets that I'm hoping mine will like since nobody else will touch these things. I haven't seen him eat any of these yet though, but alongside the hair algae, he has eaten a lot of fuzzy crap that nobody else will touch.

I've got a couple spots where the snails don't go (sump return outlets for one) that got positively overrun with hair algae every week or two. I don't know if it will be enough in the long run so I'm hoping to try the pellets or wafers thing down the road. (Just have to find one that I see him eat!)

[danny zubot]

How long does the hair algae need to be before your hare will eat it? My tank(recently overhauled) is just beginning its diatome cycle, the hair algae is only a mm long.

[spikehs]

not to sure, I don't thing the length really mattters, but if its still short, I would grab some snails before it becomes a prob.. the hare will mow it all down in no time.