xAyanex Posted March 28, 2017 Share Posted March 28, 2017 That Bird of Paradise looks awesome! 1 Quote Link to comment
teenyreef Posted March 29, 2017 Author Share Posted March 29, 2017 7 hours ago, xAyanex said: That Bird of Paradise looks awesome! Thanks! It's one of my favorites. It's growing fast, especially considering how small it was to start. 1 Quote Link to comment
teenyreef Posted March 29, 2017 Author Share Posted March 29, 2017 A few more pictures for the new page Tubbs Stellata Montipora: Red Planet. The reds have turned purple, and there's a lot of green now. Boo. CR Strawberry Fields. Not doing great, but not bad either. Montipora Setosa. This guy actually looks better than when I first got him, and he's growing great. Tyree Bali Tricolor. Colors have morphed a bit but it's still doing pretty well. 9 Quote Link to comment
fishfreak0114 Posted March 29, 2017 Share Posted March 29, 2017 The red planet may not be red, but it still looks pretty 1 Quote Link to comment
teenyreef Posted March 30, 2017 Author Share Posted March 30, 2017 9 hours ago, fishfreak0114 said: The red planet may not be red, but it still looks pretty Thanks - honestly I'm just happy that most of the corals aren't brown In other news, I'm still struggling with the zoas. Which makes me sad because this tank used to be a magic zoa growing machine. I took some macro shots tonight to see what was going on. Here are three random frags that were closest to the camera: Some have algae, some don't, but the one thing they all have in common are the little hair worms. You have to look carefully, but they're in all three pictures, and the polyps nearest the worms are the most pissed off. Here's a detail of one of them - this is the lower right corner of the first picture: Normally I'd view most worms as beneficial clean up crew, but these seem to be especially bad for the zoas, and I seem to have the most of them all over the zoas. I'm going to dip the zoas again, probably in Bayer instead of peroxide, and I'm going to try to find a fish that might eat them. From what I've found in my research so far, it seems that six lines are hit or miss, a few people reported that their yellow coris wrasse ate them, and the go-to solution seems to be a copperband butterfly fish. Which won't fit in a 40g tank, unfortunately. I was actually leaning towards a six line because the angel and the clowns are pretty assertive and can probably hold their own if the six line decides to be a bully. But if he won't eat the hair worms then there's not much point. But the yellow coris wrasse has a reputation for being shy and needing peaceful tank mates. So I'm not sure how he'd do in this tank. So I think I'm going to just see what's in stock at the LFS. If they have a yellow coris wrasse, I'll try one, otherwise I'll go with the six line. Quote Link to comment
teenyreef Posted March 30, 2017 Author Share Posted March 30, 2017 So since I seem to be in ugly coral picture mode, this is a good time for the next couple shots. Over the last two or three months, I've had three corals stn, each one at a different time, weeks apart. Two of them were nameless ones from the ASD ten pack, and the third was the PC rainbow. There didn't seem to be any reason for them to stn, but the really interesting thing is that I didn't touch them at all after they started to stn, and after a few days, they stopped with just a little bit of tissue left. So I've left them right where they are just to see what happens and if they can recover. Of the three, I think one is completely gone, but the other two seem to be holding their own. This one from the ASD ten pack stopped for a little while, but then resumed it's stn. I'll probably throw it away this weekend. But this one from the ten pack is the one that started to stn first, and it's been stable for a good two months now. The tip that's recovering is so small I'm afraid to cut it off and glue it to a clean frag plug. Since it seems to be doing fine just as it is, I'm not going to touch it until it starts to re-encrust. And I'm super excited that the PC Rainbow is not only holding its own, but the tiny bits of tissue that are left are starting to color up 2 Quote Link to comment
teenyreef Posted March 30, 2017 Author Share Posted March 30, 2017 Well, we may as well get all the ugliness out in one night. I ended up doing a mild peroxide dip just because it was late and I could do it quickly without the need for extensive rinsing. I manually picked out a couple hair worms from the sand, and got some pictures of them in a cup. This one is about half an inch long. Warning, if you don't like wormy things, this would be a good time to look away, and definitely don't click the picture to zoom in on Flickr Aannnnndddd here's the other one 6 Quote Link to comment
teenyreef Posted March 30, 2017 Author Share Posted March 30, 2017 I'm pretty sure it is a cirratulid polychaete, also known as "hair worm", different from the spaghetti worm, which lives in a tube in the sand. I used this article: http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2002-06/rs/ All official reports are that these are very beneficial. But there are several reports from people complaining that they piss their zoas off, which is what I'm seeing. Found another picture of one that says it's a cirratulid polychaete : 2 Quote Link to comment
fishfreak0114 Posted March 30, 2017 Share Posted March 30, 2017 Well I might just be weird, but those worms are kinda cute in their own special way. Mind you, I've yet to find something alive that I don't use that adjective for (aside from many of the guys at my school ). What about them is beneficial? Are they all over your tank, or specifically inhabiting the zoas? 1 Quote Link to comment
teenyreef Posted March 30, 2017 Author Share Posted March 30, 2017 27 minutes ago, fishfreak0114 said: Well I might just be weird, but those worms are kinda cute in their own special way. Mind you, I've yet to find something alive that I don't use that adjective for (aside from many of the guys at my school ). What about them is beneficial? Are they all over your tank, or specifically inhabiting the zoas? They're good for processing detritus. They appear anywhere in the sand bed, but for whatever reason, I primarily see them on the zoas. They don't bother the palys, only the zoas. 1 Quote Link to comment
J-Ranko Posted March 30, 2017 Share Posted March 30, 2017 They live in the sand, eh? Glad I went bare bottom. Of course I still have a few giant bristle worms in the live rock, but they only come out at night so I guess that makes it OK. 2 Quote Link to comment
kimberbee Posted March 30, 2017 Share Posted March 30, 2017 Did you keep them in a jar?? 1 Quote Link to comment
holy carp Posted March 30, 2017 Share Posted March 30, 2017 That is a pretty cool and colorful worm, but really too bad they aren't zoa compatible. Are there a lot of them or just a few? I guess that if they really gravitate to the zoas, a dip should be an easy way to rid yourself of them. If they're more spread out, then I don't know what would kill them. FWIW, I have found with other worms that they are often super sensitive to even small amounts of peroxide, so that might be an option if the bayer doesn't work. 1 Quote Link to comment
teenyreef Posted March 30, 2017 Author Share Posted March 30, 2017 5 hours ago, kimberbee said: Did you keep them in a jar?? Haha, like your monster? NO! I washed them down the sink. And ran the garbage disposal. And I thought about following it up with acid and flames. 5 hours ago, holy carp said: That is a pretty cool and colorful worm, but really too bad they aren't zoa compatible. Are there a lot of them or just a few? I guess that if they really gravitate to the zoas, a dip should be an easy way to rid yourself of them. If they're more spread out, then I don't know what would kill them. FWIW, I have found with other worms that they are often super sensitive to even small amounts of peroxide, so that might be an option if the bayer doesn't work. Yes, peroxide works well to get them to let go of the frag plugs, but they mostly live in the sand and reach up to the zoas, so they don't come out of the tank with the frags. They mostly hang out under the zoas, but there are enough of them in the sand that they just repopulate on the zoas after a dip. These ones were sitting on the sand after I dug up the zoas, and they move slowly enough that I was able to just scoop them up. 2 Quote Link to comment
kimberbee Posted March 30, 2017 Share Posted March 30, 2017 21 minutes ago, teenyreef said: Haha, like your monster? NO! Darn... 1 Quote Link to comment
Weetabix7 Posted March 30, 2017 Share Posted March 30, 2017 15 hours ago, teenyreef said: Well, we may as well get all the ugliness out in one night. I ended up doing a mild peroxide dip just because it was late and I could do it quickly without the need for extensive rinsing. I manually picked out a couple hair worms from the sand, and got some pictures of them in a cup. This one is about half an inch long. Warning, if you don't like wormy things, this would be a good time to look away, and definitely don't click the picture to zoom in on Flickr Aannnnndddd here's the other one Would you believe I've always wanted to have one of these? True story. 3 Quote Link to comment
teenyreef Posted March 30, 2017 Author Share Posted March 30, 2017 9 minutes ago, Weetabix7 said: Would you believe I've always wanted to have one of these? True story. You're welcome to come get them all! Quote Link to comment
Nano sapiens Posted March 30, 2017 Share Posted March 30, 2017 18 hours ago, teenyreef said: Well, we may as well get all the ugliness out in one night. I ended up doing a mild peroxide dip just because it was late and I could do it quickly without the need for extensive rinsing. I manually picked out a couple hair worms from the sand, and got some pictures of them in a cup. This one is about half an inch long. Warning, if you don't like wormy things, this would be a good time to look away, and definitely don't click the picture to zoom in on Flickr Aannnnndddd here's the other one Wonders of nature, technically known as 'squishy-stringy-snotty-slimy-wormie-thingies' Awesome...except when they piss off your Zoas! 2 Quote Link to comment
teenyreef Posted March 31, 2017 Author Share Posted March 31, 2017 3 hours ago, Nano sapiens said: Wonders of nature, technically known as 'squishy-stringy-snotty-slimy-wormie-thingies' Awesome...except when they piss off your Zoas! My thoughts exactly. These worms need to go be wonderful in some other tank that doesn't have zoas I pulled a couple dozen of them out of the sand tonight. My technique is to lift up the zoa rock, check for worms hiding in the rock, and then sift through the sand a bit. The worm tends to contract and float up a bit so it's fairly easy to find them and pick them out of the sand. Other than the gross factor of picking them up with my fingers it was a pretty easy operation. I also checked under several other frags that are on little rocks buried under the sand, including acans, an unidentified acro/monti, dendros, and favites. None of them had worms in the sand underneath, even though some of them are less than an inch from the infested zoa frags. So only the frags with zoas or palys have the worms. I have no idea why but it's really interesting. Plus that give me hope that I can eliminate them, or at least keep them under control, since they don't seem to be living elsewhere in the tank. Quote Link to comment
teenyreef Posted March 31, 2017 Author Share Posted March 31, 2017 For those that are interested, I also got a short video. The quality isn't the best but it shows how the gills/tentacles move around. 2 Quote Link to comment
jack1978 Posted March 31, 2017 Share Posted March 31, 2017 Those worms are ####ing disturbing! 2 Quote Link to comment
Reefkid88 Posted March 31, 2017 Share Posted March 31, 2017 Those look like something you would find on Mars or something... 1 Quote Link to comment
Mariaface Posted March 31, 2017 Share Posted March 31, 2017 They're so cute! Do you spot feed the zoas with fine particle foods? They may be feasting on that.. 1 Quote Link to comment
markalot Posted March 31, 2017 Share Posted March 31, 2017 Acros are looking fantastic. I can't keep most zoas in my SPS tank, and I can't keep acros in the little tank where zoas do well. 1 Quote Link to comment
Weetabix7 Posted March 31, 2017 Share Posted March 31, 2017 On 3/29/2017 at 11:50 PM, teenyreef said: So since I seem to be in ugly coral picture mode, this is a good time for the next couple shots. Over the last two or three months, I've had three corals stn, each one at a different time, weeks apart. Two of them were nameless ones from the ASD ten pack, and the third was the PC rainbow. There didn't seem to be any reason for them to stn, but the really interesting thing is that I didn't touch them at all after they started to stn, and after a few days, they stopped with just a little bit of tissue left. So I've left them right where they are just to see what happens and if they can recover. Of the three, I think one is completely gone, but the other two seem to be holding their own. This one from the ASD ten pack stopped for a little while, but then resumed it's stn. I'll probably throw it away this weekend. But this one from the ten pack is the one that started to stn first, and it's been stable for a good two months now. The tip that's recovering is so small I'm afraid to cut it off and glue it to a clean frag plug. Since it seems to be doing fine just as it is, I'm not going to touch it until it starts to re-encrust. And I'm super excited that the PC Rainbow is not only holding its own, but the tiny bits of tissue that are left are starting to color up This is really interesting to me, please keep us updated on this!!!! Not sure how I missed this last time I stopped by. 1 Quote Link to comment
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.