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Re: SAE dietary preferences
Roxanne Bittman said....
>Personally, I am not that impressed with the algae-eating behavior of SAEs
>and wish there were more other alternatives. I also use Otocinclus and
>ghost shrimp (which do eat hair algae to some extent), but they feed
>differently than SAEs. Someone's comment that one needs to have a variety
>of algae eaters is well taken.
>The other thing I don't care for about SAEs is their tendency to get
>territorial toward their own kind. I had three in a 20gal tank and the
>slightly larger, and therefore dominant, one always chased the other two
>away from food. They actually starved to death. Now the dominant one is
>alone and will remain that way.
Four of my tanks have SAEs. There are 22 in the 180 gallon, 6 in the
30 gallon, and the two fifteen gallon tanks have 2 and 3 respectively.
There is no harassment except in the case of the trio. One fish
dominates exactly as Roxanne described. The problem was solved by
separating the food slices. Even the duo which are hungry enough to
eat some plants are always pals.
--
Dave Whittaker
ac554 at FreeNet_Carleton.ca