tell me..who protects your reef?

[JDigital]

180G - Axilspot Hogfish. This guy picks at any new coral rock I put in and is constantly hunting in the rocks. Mated Diamond Gobies keep my sand incredibly white. Tangs and Foxface seem to keep any algae in check.

62G - Yellow Wrasse is likely keeping any pests or bugs at bay. or the Candy Stripe Hogfish.

[The Grizz]

I would have to say it's my Checkerboard Wrasse when I got him just over a yr ago he was only about 2" long. Now he is HUGE, around 4" & a good 1" thick. Haven't seen many little pests in the 165 gal for a while now except for the colonial hydroids.

[Wayne]

I would have to say it was my Coral Banded Shrimp, I hate bristle worms and he just destroyed them before he got too old

[neoh]

bicolor angel. She's a beast.

[pinkreef]

Sailfin tang and tailspot blenny take care of algae
filefishes take care of the aptasia
porcelain crab takes care of floating stuff
wrasses take care of snails and teenie seastars and worms
gobie keeps sand clean
regal tang keeps everybody in check by stopping any fights

[kien]

My regal anglefish.



He is such a workhorse as he constantly picks at my weedy SPS corals. The result is very little polyp extension during the day and likely slowing down the growth of my SPS. Without him my tank would probably be completely overgrown with SPS. Who wants that?!

All kidding aside (actually I wasn't really kidding), I would have to say my entire army of inverts truly help keep my reef ticking along. From my hermit crabs, my sand sifting starfish, sea urchins, crabs, to various shrimp (peppermint, fire, skunk cleaner, etc). You hardly see them do much but they are hard at work constantly performing chores. Cleaning rocks, cleaning the sand bed, cleaning corals, cleaning fish. Cleaning, cleaning, cleaning! They are my All-Star team. Always cleaning and doing something useful!























Go team go!

[tony_3a]

Love my coral beauty angelfish, basically the mod in the tank, swims around and nobody screws with her but if others are fighting/getting abused she will just swim by and it will stop. Pretty funny to see actually.

Copperband I bought just because it was eating everything, and it turns out when I got it home it also liked aptasia, so that was a plus.

And of course the Lawnmower blenny, one of the most inexpensive fish but looks pretty cool and does an amazing job of keeping all the algaes in the tank in check.

[asylumdown]

Doliatus rabbitfish. There's not a species of algae it won't eat. Even picks at dinos. The only place I have algae growing is where corals have grown in to tight for it to reach.

Second to that is my Copper Band butterfly. I cleared out the aiptasia problem in my tank with berghia, and now I'm pretty sure my Copper Band is responsible for keeping them out as a few have popped back up in the sump, but not a single one in the display.

Finally, and probably most important of all - my long horn cowfish, because it's so freaking charismatic even my partner Kelly, who sees my tank as nothing more than a giant money devouring vortex, loves it. The amount of leeway I've been given on the tank and the relationship/tank capital I've banked by having that guy floating at the glass begging all our dinner party guests for food while Kelly talks about how cool he is is quite literally worth that fishes weight in gold.

[rickcasa]

Once the bully ever since he was acquired, my Humbug damsel had shown a very unique turn about. He would be a defender of bullying that he was once champion to protect newly introduced fish. I first observed this with a Clarkii he saved from being torn to shreds by a spawning percula pair. He would literally get in the way of an attack and stay on his guard in the corner where the Clarkii found refuge. It happened 4 other tines with a purple Firefish, another clarkii, and a yellow tang he protected from a much bigger purple tang.
But alas, having moved him and all my fish into the bigger 180, he's reverted back to being a bully and harasses anyone new.