how many snails should i have?

[Frogspawn]

i have a 30g SW reef tank and i only ave about 8 snails if that i found that snails make easy pickns for hermits and when they die they hurt my water. so i am thinkng about just having snails. looks like they do a better job anyway. how many should i have? i dont want to spend the money on a cleaner crew from any web site i would rather build my own. so what should i start off with?

 

[dsmlrussell]

i have about 15 in my 29 and they do a pretty good job. I also have about 2 or 3 hermits.

 

[melosu58]

I would say about 10-15 would be a good number. It will also matter how mature your tank is. If it is fairly new then there wont be enough for them to eat and they will starve. When did you start this tank?

 

[Frogspawn]

middle of last month. its was up and running by the end of the month. but i got alot of alage growing and i dont want it to get out of hand. i am thinking i might need to get my 25watt UV light out and use it
will that help with alage?

 

[melosu58]

Well I use one but they only kill the algea spores that go through the chamber. It wont do anything for the hair algea already in the tank.

 

[Frogspawn]

i dont have any hair alage just plain old green and red alage. its grows on top of the power head and on the back and sides of the tank. snails are trying there best but i guess it to much lol. i scrub most of it off with a brush to help out and the hermits eat it so i will get a few more snails mabey 10 more i think i got plenty hermtis (6-8) well see 1 day at a time.