i was wondering why most yumas seem to have a similar demise and stumbled across this little article on facebook, seems fairly probable.

http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=172697536241

that link does not work. What demise are you talking about? I have quite a few yuma and no demise with them.

seems to be mostly the hot pink morph will get a hole in or near its oral disk and then suddenly melt away.

reef-geeks wrote:

"Ricordea Yuma care
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Monday, November 9, 2009 at 3:24pm
This is the king of the corallimorphs as far as I am concerned there are none that can compare to the color combinations that these mushroom corals come in.


One would think since that they are mushrooms that they are very simple, easy and there for hardy corals to take care of. This thought would be far from the truth, with 10s of 1000 imports of this coral coming into the country they are in the similar percentages of death rate as Elegance corals.
I cannot count how many threads have been posted on many forums about these corals and them melting for what seems to be no reason. I personally have had many a purchase go south 1-2 weeks after acclimation. In most cases it is some form of bacterial infection that seems to infect these corals at a high rate.
There are many color forms of the Ricordea Yuma with the most sought after being the Hot red and Fluorescent pink along with metallic rainbows . Most of which I have spent $1000+ over the years and have nothing to show for it other then a good thrashing from the wife. In fact the one I have had the longest just melted this past week after a year in my tank but that is another story. Over the years of observation on these corals in captive systems I have gathered quite a few ideas to help with getting these corals over the 2 week hump( this is what I call it).
In most cases of melting after acclimation it is the first 2 weeks that the infection will show itself. Sometimes longer but this has been the rule of thumb for what I have personally seen and in talking to some other Ricordea collectors.
Ricordea Yuma enjoy the same conditions as most other corals parameters in the proper ranges that we reefers keep, Ca 400+/-, Alk 8+/-, Nitrates 0-10, Ammonia 0, Nitrites 0. I have noticed that when alk drops to lower levels they tend to not expand and look as nice much in the same manner as Ricordea Florida and other soft corals.
The 2 week hump.
Most of the high end Yuma that we see posted on forums are usually sold over the internet unless you live in an area like California where most if not all indo pacific imports come into the U.S. These shops in the west coast get the cream of the crop when it comes to high end Yuma and allot of them end up on on-line websites. In the pictures they look great, healthy fully expanded and worthy of the high dollar price(IMHO). So we pay the cost and have them shipped over night to us and our tanks. Over the years I have acclimated them over and over the same way. Float, temp acclimate, turkey baster some water into bag over time etc.....One thing that has never really been discussed with these corals imparticular is Photo acclimation which we will discuss later.
So after we feel they have been acclimated to our water conditions we place them into our tanks. Most read on-line site that they like really low flow, low light etc, so now they are placed in what we think is a good spot and the next day the lights come on. The lights come on and they look great and fill up and expand to show their glory. Day after day they seem to look good. We are happy with the purchase and take pics to show pics on-line to show off our new acquisition. Everybody says their Ohs and Ahs and life goes on, so we think.
What happens next from my experience and others I have conversed with is they start to shrivel and dont expand like they did the first few days. Now there seems to be a clear most times and dark brown others slime that starts coming out of the mouth. Ooh NO! we think to ourselves what is happening? So we go on line to find some answers and what do we find? Not much as far as info when it comes to infections of Yuma, although I am sure you will find posts by a few Ricordea collectors like Madadi, Azurel(myself) and a few others. So far there has been no answers from anyone in the industry or hobbyist as to the answer to how to stop and save them. What are the signs of a sick or dying Yuma?
Well first and foremost like I said they began to shrivel and spit a clear slime. If left alone they will soon be covered in a heavy slime around the base of the polyp. One thing that I noticed that had first been unknown was that these Yuma seem to all have a hole at the base of the inside of the polyp. This hole is directly across from the mouth or oral cone, It seems this infection eats a hole into the base of the Yuma from the inside out and travels into the stem and up into the polyp disk. At about this time the polyp will begin to gap open, where as the mouth expands and opens up to non-normal size and looks slack. The slime has increased and death is immentant.
I have tried many things to try and save these corals and others have as well. One collector that I have had personal contact with Madadi has even tried human antibiotics to no avail. All the signs of his Yuma that died also showed the same signs as mine and others.
I have dipped in SW/ Iodine, FW/Iodine, Amino acids, Furan2, Melafix Marine, and a few others I cant think of I am sure. None of these dips worked and the only one that has shown promise so far is Melafix Marine a Tea tree extract. I think that one of the things that is needed is a actual lab study like on the scale of E. Borneman did with Elegance corals.
Photo acclimation? What do I mean by this?
I have found through the years of acquiring these corals and trial and errors is that they seem to be very sensitive to lighting. Photo acclimation as I describe it is after all other acclimation procedures is placing these corals into a highly shaded area of the tank and leave them there. Here is how I have done it to the few that I have in my tank that are doing good.
I find a place that still has mod flow, almost completely shaded from direct or indirect lighting. I place it there and leave it. As long as it shows signs of being healthy and it expanding I leave it till it stretches for light. Usually it has taken the ones I have bought about a month or so before they show any signs for reaching. One thing to keep an eye on is that they dont bleach from not having enough light and in that case you will have to move them out a little bit more so they can get a small amount of light. But the ones I have had will begin to stretch for light and will need to be moved.
I do not move them very far so the conditions will be about the same but lighting will increase but not by a whole lot. I then wait for them to stretch more and move again till they are in in-direct lighting. I personally have only a few that are in direct lighting or high indirect lighting and they were purchased locally.
Although some of them seem to be bleaching at the moment from direct lighting and will be placed into indirect lighting to regain color and health. I have seen some reefers that keep them in direct lighting of MH, and T-5 but I have not had a single one that has made it long term in that lighting. It is in my opinion that photo acclimation is the number one thing in the long term health and survivability of Ricordea Yuma. It seems that there is something that takes place with these corals during shipping that reduces the survivability of these corals. I have seen them online time and time again and have talked to many vendors that will take updated pics of them for me and they do look healthy but for some reason after shipping there tends to be an increase in the death rate. I have talked to these vendors and they have had the same issues with Yuma in their shipments also LFSs many of which have quite ordering them for the very reason of having them melt on them. Which for them is a loss in sales and their livelihood. I plan to continue my quest for Ricordea Yuma and the elusive Hot red and fluorescent pink Yuma.


If any others have anything to add lease do so, if you have saved these through chemical dips etc please let me know so I can add that to my arsenal to save these corals."

Wow, where was this info a week ago when I bought my rock with 5 yumas on it? Two of the 5 have begun to do exactly what is described in this article. Thank you for posting this article, the info will be important to a ton of people. Are Florida rics also doomed or is that the way I need to lean when looking for rics? Learnin' everyday, unfortunatly this lesson just cost me $75.
Thanks again.

Well I will see, since I just got a pink/green center yuma. I have 4 orange and one yellow and they did not melt.

Also very hard to beleive that furan 2 have no result but melafix does???! because melafix is far far from being as strong antibiotic as furan.

Do you have any photo of your yuma melting?

Mine often have brown slime coming out of their mouth but they are simply shriveling and pooping, then back to normal.

my pleasure,

i dont think florida ricordia are as susceptible to this same type of infection, or not anything i have gathered. ouch, expensive lesson. though to no fault of your own.

i havnt had any real long term sucess with yumas either. though i tend to pick the vibrant morphs more. i think i may be loosing one more to this same malady.

to what i have had happen in the past. light is very import to yumas. yumas that started in the low light will live and those that are put in high light will tend to have a higher chance of melting.

the one i have it is more than likely that its demise is due to too much light, my lfs had it in direct light.

i do have mine in the shade since it was put into my tank, however it looks like it has that hole described in the article. seemingly the kiss of death. i just went over to the tank and its mesenterial filaments are hanging out. i have a feeling its a gonner.




edit: unfinished scentence! lol

I have mine in a Biocube 14g with the stock lights (nanotuners "stock" replacement bulbs anywho) and have the rock at the bottom, do you think the other 'shrooms might be ok or should I try to shade them anyways? I would hate to lose the other 3 if I could save them.

definitely shade them, ive also heard they are terribly sensitive to sg swings and temps higher than 80 degrees.

I never had a ricordea melting and I have them for months, yuma and florida. I keep mine between 75 to 77 F.

They like to toutch each other. They like the close proximity of their kind.

Mine are under power compact so this is quite low light. Maybe that's why mine don't melt, not sure.

The pink one I just got was acclimated for a week at the store, now it's in my tank.

one way to save a yuma that has started to melt is to cut of in few pieces and discard the infected area, trying to keep part of the mouth with each piece. These will probably grow back to full.

I cut ricordea florida before and they recovered well but never tried a yuma but it's better to try that then to let it die.

When my mushroom (green mush) melted away I took a sample and looked at it under the microscope and there were tons of opportunistic protozoare eating it. It probably started as a bacterial infection, then the protozoares take over and eat everything.

any pic of that hole?

im tempted to try and cut it up to save it. however im hesitant in the same right as a shred of hope keeps me hanging on that this mysterious hole will heal. also im hesitant to cut it up and spread the infection further. you do have a good point though, why not give it a go and try to save it rather than let it just die.

what struck me as interesting with the article is the relation to stress and this sudden onset of a potential bacterial infection. perhaps stress weakens the corals natural defenses to this disease. hence they melt away rapidly.

this particular demise seems relatively commonplace, as ive been doing a ton of digging the past couple of days and hear virtually the same story over and over again. in all sorts of conditions, under proper light, water params, and not so proper.

i dont have a decent picture of the hole, however i do have a pic taken of the yuma the day i put it into the tank on my bow thread in my sig, pg 2. ill try to take one tomorrow.

Wow, that's quite a post.

In my experience Yumas can be either very frustrating...or really easy

Frustrating: My last attempt to keep an exquisite 'Hot-pink' and a 'Watermelon' that had been transshipped from Indonesia directly to a LFS ended in grief. Just as you mentioned they looked great for a week or two...then they start to 'melt'. I've tried a few dips ranging from fresh water to Furan, but I haven't found anything to stop the demise. Within a few days they were completely gone. I've noticed a similar melt-down phenomenon with Blastomussa, but without the proper scientific tools it is impossible to diagnose the cause. As you mentioned, Elegance corals can be afflicted by a similar condition which I personally experienced over 15 years ago with my one and only Elegance purchase.

Easy:: In my experience the orange Yumas that are often imported from Vietnam and Singapore are as tough as R. florida. Same usually goes for the more common neon green ones that often come from the same areas.

This is my 5 year old orange Yuma that's been soaking up the rays for the last 2 years in a 12g Nano:



When I first acclimated this coral under medium PC lighting it spit out a large amount of zooxanthellae and shriveled up, so I moved it down to the bottom of the tank and slowly brought it back up into more direct light. If I had done the same thing with a 'Hot-pink' Yuma it almost certainly would have melted. Of interest is that when my Hot-pink and Watermelon Yumas disintegrated it had absolutely no effect on this orange Yuma which indicates to me that this particular Yuma strain has a natural immunity to this condition.

Based on my experiences and what I've read from others, I would hypothesize that Yumas collected from different geographical areas have varying degrees of immunity to this meltdown affliction. This could be due to the different Yuma strains involved, the photo sensitivity of the individual related to the depth they were collected at, the type(s) of zooxanthellae and bacteria that the Yuma possess, or perhaps some other undetermined factor(s).

fantastic info Nano sapiens!

thanks.

though that initial post isnt mine, i cut and pasted the original article from a facebook page.

now that you bring that point to light that definitely makes perfect sense that it may be in part due to geography. as well as depth of collection.


im fighting an uphill battle though as my 16 gal tank is lit by a 150w halide. even in indirect light it may be too much.

i found this guys article on another forum. hopefully this link will work. it says virtually the same thing though.

http://www.reef-geeks.com/forums/softie-ge...-yuma-care.html

It depends on the individual Yuma, but it looks like you have the sensitive Yuma types. Since you are starting to loose another one you might want to try and cut the head off the base well above the infection and place it in a shady area with very mild current to see if it will recover.

it is already located in complete shade on a piece of rubble.

my real quandary is to attempt to cut away the seemingly diseased tissue and hope that the infection is localized and i can remove it all.

or leave it alone and hope for the best. lol.

neither option seems terrible pleasing though.



this shot was taken just before i moved it further back into that recess. notice how it is not circular, and from what i understand that and a 'tight' mouth are two indicators of a healthy yuma. neither of which do this specimen display. urgh. the portion that is severely shriveled is where the hole is located, and also where i believe that the mesenterial filaments are coming from, and not directly from the mouth. the hole is in its beginning stages and not yet a full blown gaping.

I just had my rock with about 8 heads of orange R. Floridia melt in a matter of three days. I fragged a few pieces off two weeks prior and everyone looked to be healed compltely and then a brown jelly just melted them. I have fragged those same pieces in the past with no problems but have no idea what happened this time.

thanks jeff for your input.



ive fed the yuma a couple of formula one pellets in hopes that a little supplemental energy will help aid the healing process. if by tomorrow evening there is no real improvement i think i may put it under the knife unless i get any other advice otherwise. its not exactly eating in the classical sense though it has extruded its filaments around the pellets, in perhaps a hapless attempt to feed. or due to a little more stress to the mix. ill also be doing a water change in the morning and see if that helps at all either. i hate mucking around too much with the darn thing as i really dont want to stress it out any more. id hate to loose it.

its such a gorgeous polyp, that shot dosnt even come close to doing its true colors justice.

I don't know why but only time I feel my Yumas are healthy is when they close up and become a little ball. When they reopen they're always more full size and colorful. It's like they regenerated.

You could try vitamine C dosing as this is said to increase coral immune system but it's best to do that before something start to melt probably.

Mine is just like yours. Hot pink with green in the center like yours. So far so good. I will see if it pass the 2 weeks period but it come from a very good shop where the guy really is knowledgeable. He has it for 1 week in the shop before selling it.

He has many and none have melted. Most are hot pink with green or blue.

good luck Dani3d.

it hasnt started to melt just yet, thankfully. though it sure dosnt look hot. hope it makes it for ya. mine is actually more of a powder blue, with a green mouth, and a touch of orange around the edges. too bad my photography stinks. lol.

urgh.....




no real improvement..... looks like i may have to put it under the knife tonight after work. on the other hand at least it hasnt gone down hill any further either.

Maybe you should wait a little. Usualy when they melt it happens very fast so if it has not melted yet, i may not do it and may recover.

Once the infection is there and the protozoaire start to dig in, it's a matter of hours, not days.

I would only cut if in pieces if it is clearly getting worse.

I know a few people who have hot pink recordeas and they did not melt.

well folks.

took drastic measures, decided to cut away the bad part off of the yuma. lets hope it will heal up. though im a bit concerned that the cut wasnt very clean. in the back of my head i cant help but think i may have just finished it off. urgh.

oh crap. lmao.

i guess i should have read your reply Dani3d before i started cutting. though this morning it did look as if the infection was spreading a bit, it wasnt just localized to the one spot it was beginning to spread around to the other side of the mouth.

wish me and the yuma luck.

Wow! what a great read! When I first started reefing I bought 10 Florida ricordia on Ebay...they all melted except 2 blue ones with a pink mouth..I just bought this one today

and the yellow was in my bros AP24 under 150w MH pheonix 14k all the way on top..so hopefully this one is good to go under my PC lighting...

I will move the pink one since I do not know how long or where the LFS got it from. I will keep you guys and gals posted!
I feed live phyto, dose reef plus. dose 2 part and use natural sea water...no skimmer in my 40 long

yes pretty drastic but if it was doomed anyway.

I hope it will recover and grow new coral from the split. Did you keep part of the mouth with it? It is supposed to go faster for regeneration when keeping a bit of the mouth.

I do dose with vitamine C and iodine when I get new coral or when I see some potential problem, just to be safe. I use vitamine C that is buffered.

The problem with treating with furan 2 is that once the protozoares take over furan-2 will not kill them and once they have a way inside the coral they will pretty much eat all the symbiotic algea. I took a sample of one mushroom that I had wich was melting and saw the whole thing.. It was scary to watch thousands of these bugs inside and around the mushroom tissue eating the symbiotic algea. They feed on the algea, not really on the mushroom tissue as all I could see inside the protozoares was Zooxanthellae, nothing else. So furan may kill the bacteria which started the infection but will not kill the bugs.

I read that chloramphenicol (dangerous chimical that can cause anemia in human!) or eurthomycin will work but if you can actualy find that. amoxycillin 500mg per 10g per day for 3 days also said to work and minght be easier to find. I never tried either.

I hadn't heard of R. florida melting until I read a few accounts on this site.

Nice looking Yumas. Hope they do well for you.

Clean cuts aren't all they're cracked up to be IMO. Think about it logically, clean cuts are hard for most any animal to recover from because it's hard to form clots and such. That being said i still use a fresh razor when doing my cuts .

thanks envy!

i thought you all might appreciate that article. poses some interesting points. good luck with your pink one. its gorgeous! it looks like its a lot better off than mine.


Dani3d,

i read an extensive article on yuma fragging before i took the knife to it. i kept most of the mouth and only cut away the damaged tissue. it looks a little better than before, still a slack mouth though, and its filaments are still hanging out of where the cut was made. it is still hanging on to the rubble its on which is a good sign in my book. i probably wont do any sort of dosing, medications or dips though. ill leave it up to the yuma and the gods to see if it heals from my surgery.

sfork,

thanks bud for the encouragement. that makes perfect sense though. it does seem to be healing up a little better.

I think you did the right thing because you got rid of the millions bacterias and protozoares eating your yuma. that will give her a chance to heal much better because once these bugs are in, pretty hard to stop them and cutting them off is protably the best thing to do. Tough thing to do though and I feel your pain doing it..must be hard.

I read that it start with bacteria of vibrio type and then that's the open door for protozoares.

For the vitamine C, I only dose 5ppm as a preventive and this is very low dose. So that's 100 mg of buffered vitamine C in 20 gallons.

i absolutely agree, id rather hack it up than let the bugs eat it away into nothing. it sure wasnt easy, i stood there for a few minutes with the blade in my hand starting down at the tupperware with the yuma in it just mulling it over before i took the plunge. lol.

i get really sketchy about dosing anything into my tank as ive got christmass tree worms in there and they are constant filter feeders id hate to put some thing into the tank that the worms may react poorly to, once they get something into the water that they dont like it is a rapid decline. ive sort of hit that long term success mark with these guys so the entire tanks care is tailored around them. in all actuality i dont dose a darn thing into that tank. just water changes to maintain parameters and to replace elements.

from that picture whats your opinion? does it look like it should heal up nicely? the guts that have been hanging out since yesterday morning have me a bit concerned.

guts out is normal from time to time. Mine do it also and it can be scary but as long as it does not melt with brown slimy stingy stuff then it is ok. In that picture I don't even see where you made the cut, and the ricordea looks good.

It can poop long brown stingy stuff by the mouth from time to time and this is also normal, but having brown styngy stuff from anywhere else on the ricordea is not normal.

It takes time to regenerate.

As for the feather duster, I cut a few ricordea florida last week and my clam and feather duster were not affected. I have a large hawian feather duster which lost its crown one week after I got it, then it went it its tube for a week and finaly came out with a tiny new crown. That's been a week now that it came out and the crown is almost back to its original size! So I guess the ricordea mucus did not bother it and did not stop it from growning its crown back.

The real sensitive thing in my tank is the alveopora. A slightest change, even just a water change, and it does not extend.

I see you have a blueberry gorgonian, how is it doing? Mine is not doing well despite the ton of specialyzed food I put in the tank each day. These are really hard to keep.

thanks Dani3d,

i really appreciate you taking the time to go through all this with me. almost immediately after i made the cut the skirt wrapped around where the slice was made, i suppose in an attempt to close up the wound. i practically cut a 1/3 of it away. so i suppose thats a good sign or perhaps just a consolation. lol.

those christmass tree worms make feather dusters seem like a breeze to take care of, they are extremely finicky. almost like a spoiled child. lol. generally when christmass tree worms loose their crowns its the kiss of death, i have yet to have one regenerate. though they do loose their cap that covers their tube and that will regenerate.

my gorg has been doing ok, it did loose a bit of tissue on the bottom of the stem, mostly from me manhandling it trying to get it into a decent spot in the tank. i have found that it dosnt seem to like excessive flow or light. i get the most feeding response from detritus, so i usually stir up the tank at least once every two days, some times once a day. ive hit that two month mark with this guy, so thats got to be some sort of quasi success. thats another species that is very finicky. how long have you had yours? oh! and do you have a tank thread? id love to see what youve got going on.

I have my blueberry gorgonian for 3 weeks now and it's not doing very well. I can see tissue necrosis and I might have to frag parts of it so that it does not spread more. I get great feeding response from Fauna Marin Ultra Seafan and Ultra Min F. It always open right after I put these foods in the water.

The polyps are getting smaller though, and some have started to disapear so not good.

They usualy slowly die within 6 months. It is extremely rare to see one survive much longer than that, even in specialized tank with lots of food.

Does yours show new grow?

Here is my tank. The sponge is doing very well and the scallop too.

http://www.nano-reef.com/gallery/showphoto...mp;ppuser=49626

Howdy folks,

You guys are scaring me! I've just bought an ultra pink and green Yuma, and now I'm worried. The person I bought the Yuma from has had his yuma's for about 2 years. He started out with 50 2 years ago, and now has a about 100. He told me he hasn't had any problem caring for them under direct t5 lighting. They've doubled in numbers so he's been selling them often.

I just called vivid aquariums and the guy who answered the phone said he's never heard of anyone having problems keeping them in the ten years he's been involved with reef tanks. The yuma's they have in their 800 gallon tank have been there for years is what he told me.

Mine is doing fine after 5 days in a orca pico(1.75g), let's see how he does in the long haul. I'm a positive thinker, so he'll make it way beyond the 2 week hump!

Cheers,
majorbonr

Captive bred Yumas are my 1st choice. Probably won't have difficulties as long as you avoid extremes.

2nd choice are wild Yumas that have been in a dealers tank for at least a month and are looking healthy.

VIVID may not trans-ship Yumas directly from the wild. Talk with wholesalers who have kept Yumas in their holding tanks for any length of time and see what they have to say about Yuma mortality.

I just called them back and the same guy told me their yuma's are wild caught and have been there for about a month with no problems. I was just there last Friday and the looked in good health and fully opened. The ones in the 800 gallon were huge, they were at least 2.5-3" big.

Cheers,
majorbonr

Heres my experience with Yumas. About 3 years ago I bought an Orange one. Eventually it had 3 babys. I wasnt happy with the way they looked under PC's. So I decided to move mommy yuma and the smallest yuma under a 150 MH (whoa boy) Eventally the large one bleached and its been under a ledge for a month and a half without a change. (the baby yuma seems unaffected) I also bought a green one months ago and it had 2 babies when it moved down a little but its doing great even midway to a MH in a 20 long. I've since changed to T5's and moved the bleached orange one and the baby next to this reddish orange one thats at the bottom right corner facing AWAY from the light. That one is doing good so far for about a month now? I figured that might be a good place to heal the bleached yuma (it still has orange in its bumps by the way.) Picked up a PURPLE Yuma from a LFS about a week and a half ago, but it had its guts coming out of its base and its mouth. I bought this one because Ive NEVER seen a purple one before, regardless of its condition. It does attach to the rock but not very well and its shaded heavily. Also the bleached one still contracts and extends constantly. Any ideas about saving the purple one?

do keep in mind that im not saying that all yumas or even all pink yumas a susceptible or even die from this. but there is a percentage that do go this way. now whether this is just how a yuma dies or whether this is indeed a true infection. bacterial and protozorae present in the tissue could well be post mortem.

in my own search i dug up countless threads about yumas dieing with this hole first. not just a melt, or a bleach.

so it definitely piqued my curiosity about the whole phenomenon.

Dani3d,

its iffy, some days i see new polyps on the gorg, some days it looks like crap. i dont expect it to ever fully come back to what it looked like in the wild, but i can certainly try to keep it going in the mean time. it was a free bee from my lfs. there always giving me chunks of doomed stuff. i think i may need to change the filters on my ro/di unit. things are starting to look a little scuzzy. that might help things a bit.

The trick with yuma's is to start them low in light and slowly acclimate them. Too little light or flow, they'll generally hop off the rock. Too much light, they'll shrink/bleach.

Tank raised yumas are your best bet. Maybe 2-3x more expensive, but worth it when a wild one is likely to die.

nemo,

ive read the same thing. however im fairly sure that the one i got had no light acclimation what so ever. and who the heck knows if it was wild caught or aquacultured. more than likely the former.


so far no real improvement, and no real decline either. its basically in the same shape as it was before. possibly healing, im not sure how long the healing process takes with yumas after fragging.

I would say things are looking good if it has not melted this far.

It can take a week or 2 to completely heal but yuma grown very slowly. You can notice growth on yuma like maybe after a month, but not that much.

If your yuma would not be healing, you would see stingy brown slime coming from it as they produce mucus when they are wounded. If you don't see any slime around that area, it is probably healed or very much on its way to heal.

2 months ago I got a rock with 2 orange yuma and on the rock there were 2 small babies the size of small green pea. 2 months later one is about the size of a 5 cent and the other about the size of a 25 cent.

Yumas take longer to heal then florida rics...I fragged this guy over a week ago, and it has already formed into a circle again.



Today

what a beautiful ricordea! must be hard to put the knife in such beautiful and healthy ricordea.

I had a lot of apprehension before I made the cut, it was easier to frag my scolys since I couldn't find any references about it. With Yumas, there are many threads from people who tried, but many were not successful. Having a longterm survivor in my tank, was the ultimate deal maker.

I finally had to remove the 2 in my tank that were melting, they just got wat too bad to leave. I took out the rock and removed them with a razor, but now there are 2 buds about the size of a pencil eraser in the same place the others were removed (I am trying to get a picture of them). Hopefully these will continue to grow and be healthy.

How is it doing? mine is doing great after 2 weeks. I have put it close to my other ricordeas so that they toutch each other and it spread wide and far. They seem to really like the contact of each other.

How is yours doing? any change?

hey Dani3d

so far so good. its still alive. though it looks just about the same as it did the last time we talked. so i guess thats something at least.

glad to hear yours is doing well too! hooray!