Banasophia’s Biocube 16 & IM Nuvo 10 ☀️

[banasophia]

1 hour ago, gena said:

Is that what they are???  Did you glue them up there?  I thought they were a type of anemone.  Very cool!!!!

Yeah, they just spawned and the planulae larvae landed there and grew. They are everywhere… sun corals are a very invasive species when they are happy. I don’t target feed the ones that grew from spawning, like those… same with the ones that were on frags that I moved to my other two tanks… but they all seem to get enough food from feeding the fish. The original colony does need target feeding, though, or the tissue recedes. 

[gena]

14 minutes ago, banasophia said:

Yeah, they just spawned and the planulae larvae landed there and grew. They are everywhere… sun corals are a very invasive species when they are happy. I don’t target feed the ones that grew from spawning, like those… same with the ones that were on frags that I moved to my other two tanks… but they all seem to get enough food from feeding the fish. The original colony does need target feeding, though, or the tissue recedes. 

That's fantastic!  I didn't know they grew that way.  How long does it take for them to get as big as those on the wall?

[banasophia]

5 minutes ago, gena said:

That's fantastic!  I didn't know they grew that way.  How long does it take for them to get as big as those on the wall?

Yeah, those are probably a year and a half old… I don’t think my suns have spawned since the pandemic started because I cut back on all the excessive feeding I used to do when the pandemic hit. Suns are all over my tank. Went to get a pic for you but they aren’t open right now so I’ll try to take one when they are open soon. 

[banasophia]

Hank chillin in his sinularia tonight

 

[banasophia]

So… I added my coral banded shrimp a few months ago hoping it would eat bristleworms. Unfortunately it’s not at all interested in the bristleworms, but it is a pretty cool little guy and I got some pics and a video of him last night that I thought I’d share.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[A.m.P]

Lazy animal doesn't even know what it's supposed to eat according to our literature, I bet its' not even bothered to read up on it either.

[banasophia]

1 hour ago, A.m.P said:

Lazy animal doesn't even know what it's supposed to eat according to our literature, I bet its' not even bothered to read up on it either.

Ikr?!

[banasophia]

[banasophia]

[banasophia]

Is it Hank, or was it another sighting of Tweety Bird?

 

 

[michael_cb_125]

Great photo of a super cute fish. 

~Michael

[gena]

He's so chubby  

[debbeach13]

2 minutes ago, gena said:

He's so chubby  

and that is not easy with that type of fish. Great job.

[banasophia]

2 hours ago, michael_cb_125 said:

Great photo of a super cute fish. 

~Michael

Thanks, he’s my supermodel fish, he trains daily for his photo shoots. 😁🤗 He even has his own hashtag on Instagram:

#strikeaposehank

1 hour ago, gena said:

He's so chubby  

Hehe, he’s a little piggy

1 hour ago, debbeach13 said:

and that is not easy with that type of fish. Great job.

I must’ve gotten lucky, he has always been an easy lil guy! He eats anything. I do heavily feed this tank though, so he has lots of options to choose from.

[banasophia]

Haha check this out - someone on Instagram pointed out Hank did the epic split challenge 😂🤣

 

[banasophia]

My new addition: Shredder the Arrow Crab. Hoping he behaves better than the coral banded shrimp… at least this guy actually eats bristleworms. 

 

 

[debbeach13]

Hi shredder. great video!

[michael_cb_125]

Awesome video!

Makes you wonder why they like eating them....

~Michael

[sam_the_reefer]

On 9/21/2021 at 1:57 PM, banasophia said:

So… I added my coral banded shrimp a few months ago hoping it would eat bristleworms. Unfortunately it’s not at all interested in the bristleworms, but it is a pretty cool little guy and I got some pics and a video of him last night that I thought I’d share.

 

 

My old one ate bristleworms, but it was the smaller gold variety.

[Ratvan]

That Arrow Crab is so cool and weird looking, great addition to the tank 

Also the video is incredible 

[banasophia]

4 hours ago, debbeach13 said:

Hi shredder. great video!

👋😁 thanks! he has another one right now and looks like he’s wringing it out like a wet towel 😆

4 hours ago, michael_cb_125 said:

Awesome video!

Makes you wonder why they like eating them....

~Michael

I know! Maybe they are really tasty. 😝 Makes me think of eating caterpillars while I was in Zambia in the Peace Corps, tasty but you could get spikes in your tongue. 😋 It seems like with the smaller bristleworms he just tears em right up and eats them, but the bigger ones take much longer. 

4 hours ago, xellos88 said:

My old one ate bristleworms, but it was the smaller gold variety.

Oh you are lucky!

4 hours ago, Ratvan said:

That Arrow Crab is so cool and weird looking, great addition to the tank 

Also the video is incredible 

Well you know the bristleworm situation has gotten out of hand when you decide to get a creepy spider looking critter to control the creepy bristleworms. But I agree, I do really like it now that I have one, it’s really cool and interesting to watch. They get really big, so my plan is to move it to the 32 as it grows… they aren’t very fast so hopefully it will be easy to catch and relocate him.
 

Hank’s not so sure he can trust Shredder though… I hope I don’t live to regret the addition. 😬

 

 

 

 

 

[banasophia]

I also added three peppermint shrimp, but no sign they are eating any aiptasia so far. 

[debbeach13]

Yes. This is so much better than dumping in chemicals right away. You can save that as a last resort. I hope they help. 

[banasophia]

1 hour ago, debbeach13 said:

Yes. This is so much better than dumping in chemicals right away. You can save that as a last resort. I hope they help. 

Oh believe me, I’ll try anything at this point… the tank is fairly overrun with bristleworms, bubble algae, and aiptasia after being pretty hands off with it for a year… I added a big order of Berghia nudibranchs for the second time a couple months ago and they won’t eat the aiptasia for some reason, at least not much of it. 
 

I’ve always resisted getting peppermints due to the risk they will harm the rock flowers, and I’ve resisted getting an arrow crab because of Hank and Finnick, but desperate times call for desperate measures. Aiptasia X works okay, but does seem to damage the sun corals, so I don’t like to use it if I can help it. I tried getting an aiptasia wand but my LFSs and Amazon don’t carry them. 

[Tamale]

Good luck fighting them off! I’ve heard peppermints do lots of work.