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Pulsing Xenia - Easy or Hard?


Catspa

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So whats the story on Pulsing Xenia?  I hear lots of people talking about it without incuring any real problems, yet most of the info i read on it refers to it needing "expert" level of care only.

 

Sooo whats the story?

 

Local store has a couple of sprigs of it that look great, and while i'm not a newbee, i don't have very much experience todate with coral, other then my green buttons (wich is still a work in progress)

 

Any advice is appreciated.

 

thxs ;)

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I can only tell you may experience with them. On May 10th I got a xenia frag from a fellow nano reefer. It split on May 25th and the split has split again. So I've found it to be very easy. I have 26 watts over my 5.5 the xenia have gotten a bit leggy, I think that adding the 13 more watts tomorrow will help them be more compact.

 

I like them, I'm going to get more varities!

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xenia - experts? naw. the only experience you need with xenia is how to keep them under control and how to frag them. i got a couple of stalks from a reefers and it has split a few times already. go into the member's thread and check of the post of my tank. youll see pics of them. btw they are easy to maintain, all you have to do is feed them.

 

then again like any other corals. just gotta watch your water parameters.

 

(Edited by HuBu at 9:18 pm on June 19, 2002)

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I've got a huge xenia.  It's sorta fragged itself onto the adjacent rocks.  I've had it for about 5 months now with no problems at all.  I'd say go for it.  Just remember - not too much current and not too little.  It shouldn't be blowing all over the place, just moving gently.

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Ok, unless someone else has something to add before tomorrow afternoon, i'm going to get some !!!

this stuff looks great! One of the frags was pumping like mad, if it wasn't attached to a rock i would have been swimming around the tank!

 

Just curious, there was 5 or 6 frags of it, three were the typical pinkish color and two were a light grey Blue color.  I've never seen the blue coloration before.  they were all pulsing, but only one of the pinks was going like crazy. So, is this blue coloration an indication of its heath, or just a color vareation?.. ie should i get one of the blues? or does this odd coloration suggest that it isn't a healthy specemin.  (and yes i think i'm definetly going to get the pink crazy one).

 

Once again, thanks for all the info!

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pink and tan xenia are the common type of xenia. but i do think that theres a strand of blueish xenia, which i read wasnt the same species yet very similar. i think the thread was at this forum. you can try searching for it. IMO i would get the blue one since its pretty neat, and i like the color blue. you can judge a xenia by how it pulse, whether the pulsers are closed up into little balls or not, and whether the stalks are elongated or shrink up. most of the time, when you touch the xenia it will shrink up and close its pulsers. you can definitely judge it by its smell, an injured xenia (one that has been just cut up) would kinda smell like the smell of scallops.

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Christopher Marks

It seems like there are two ends of the spectrum with Xenia.  I haven't had a chance to specifically identify the two types that I kept, but they were both sold as pulsing xenia.  The first one I got from an LFS and it slowly withered away and died ( it was very healthy in the store) .  The second I got were frags from Mermaid123 (Val) and grow like weeds.

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i was told by a fellow reefer on RC, who sold me a frag of tan xenia, that the xenia she has didnt survive in her friends tank for some reason. but it has been growing like weed in my tank. then again, your water condition is what matters most. especially what you feed it. it feed mine with Roti-Grow, which seems to only be market in Florida since the company is located in Florida.

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The  elongata species of xenia will do well in good illumination from pc to vho to halide. I have a huge colony that is constantly fragging on the glass of my tank. It makes it easy to renove with a razorblade and will heal rapidly. WATER QUALITY IS OF THE UTMOST IMPORTANCE. If it is unhappy, it will die and "melt" in your tank and foul everything. I feed them DTs phytoplankton, MARC WEIS coralvital and Black powder. they are weeds, but will occasionaly slow in growth and then explode again. Right now they are holding their own..... Ill include a pic in my next post (batteries are kaput)   LOOK AT MY NEEKED CHICKEN !

nekkidchicken.jpg

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i've had my xenias for 2 weeks now, and it's already in the process of spreading.  they have gotten almost twice as tall, and are pulsing alot better than when i first got them.  i thought they were not going to make it when i first got them, because they stayed in the bag for 3 hours.  but, after some tlc, and making sure my WATER WAS IN THE BEST POSSIBLE CONDITION, they have done excellent.  my roomate had some that died off.  he can't figure out why, but i think it's because he uses tap water and has alot of fish in his tank.  i have no probs so far and am very happy i got mine.  i say give it a shot =)

 

i'm not even gonna comment on the bald pecker...=)

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I have a small frag of xenia too.  I guess they are quite hardy if you give them plenty of light and enough water flow but not so much that they sway like in a hurricane.

 

I just had mine for about 5 days and they are pulsing like mad.  I say get a small frag, if it does well, it will split into a larger bunch in no time.

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The biggest killer of Xenia in the aquarium is excess nitrates.  They are super sensitive to the toxin.

 

Also, there is a marked difference between first-gen and later frags.  But these days, most of what we get is domestically propogated, so that's probably not an issue for most people.  That said, second-gen frags are much hardier than first gen, and third-gen even more so.  After that, there is little trackable difference.

 

I'm not sure how the different species vary, though.  I only have elongata, and like most people, my stuff is spreading like a weed.  It would not surprise me if other species were much less successful in aquariums.

 

Matthew

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IMO, xenia is both hard and easy.....

 

if you keep your parameters in the right condition, a xenia will grow, grow , grow , and live healthy...

 

but once it grows like crazy, thats when it gets harder....

:)

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I have xenia also. I find that they seem to pulse only in low current in my tank. Once i place them in any current, even slight, they seem to pulse less as there is no need to collect thier food on thier own as the water does the job for them. Maybe I'm just way out in left field on this one though.... hmmm

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i doubt it, but its true that they do feed thru the stalk, not only thru the pulsers. most xenia should start to pulse once light hits it.

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Nishant3789

hmmmmm i tihnk my xenia will be no morew by next week. my tnaks had a rough week because i let my salinity get to 1.040 and now its down to 1.027, i did water changes every other day and i think all this has been very rough on the xenia plus ive had cooling issues on my tank. i do not think they like anything above 83F or i think 29C? cant remeber the conversion and too lazy to do the math, but it IS weird how some people can keep it ad some can. Mine was doing great for like 4-5 months then it just suddenly stopped and now its horrible and almost melting..... o well id advise gettting some. and a note about identifiying xenia, well thats Impossible according to eric bornemanunless u want tosend a tissue sample to a very specialized lab and even then it probably wont be right.... i remember something about xenia being able to change their "forms" from pom pom to enlopngata etc. im not surebout the truth on this but its worth writeing i guess. well i hope all of this has helped c ya

nishant

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thanks everyone who contributed !

 

So i went and got some. ended up getting some of the blue stuff, the pink crazy one was gone (huummm...always the way :( )

So far it seem to be doing fine, pulsing away, i've noticed that it doesn't like  bubles (tinny ones created by my power head). I'll keep you updated on the progress.  (on the flip side my buttons don't appear great at the moment.....)

 

 

So just to recap.

 

* Xenia is hit and miss, some have problems some don't. Could be do to tank conditions or the specific individual frag of xenia the person has.

 

* Looks like if you can get the cultured stuff (wich is

often the case) you are better off.

 

* They like medium to high light, and tend to preffer the cooler temps, say around 76-78. (but have been ocasionally known to do ok in lower lights also)

 

* I suspect that its the people with the larger tanks that have problems with them, and generally, nanos don't. I suspect the reason for this is that our tanks (nanos)  tend to have better overall water quality due to the frequency and volume of our water changes... Its probably either the dosing or lack of dosing, that causes some of the problems in the larger tanks ... But as i said, we don't really have to worry about this.  (any thoughts on my theory?)

 

once again thanks for the info :)

 

 

 

(Edited by Catspa at 2:44 pm on June 21, 2002)

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