Cerith snails & red finger gorgonia problems...

[Kalanianaole]

My cerith snails are dying off and i can't figure out why. I know it's not predation, because there are no hermits/crabs/others in my tank that'll feast on them. I doubt it's water quality because I have bumblebee, nassarius and about 20 tiny unidentified hitchiker snails that're still kickin it strong, as well as other sensitive inverts like a lettuce sea slug and orange scleronephthya. If anyone knows, enlighten my skinny butt.

 

Oh, and I also have a problem with my red finger gorgonia receeding from the tips. It looks like the tips are slowly decomposing. That sounds a bit drastic, but you know. The LFS suggested I snip the affected tips, which I did, but it appears to be starting again.

 

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Rock it raw.

 

jkm

[tinyreef]

how big is your tank and how established is it? ceriths are very slow. is it possible that they're being starved out by the other faster snails? how many of all of them do (did) you have?

 

i'm assuming there's little bodies when they die and not just shells (~predation). the other two snails are relatively 'fast' compared to ceriths and i'm assuming the hitchhikers are the common tannish looking spiral whatchamacallits (i know, i'm an eggpert! )

 

also if the ceriths are keeling over their decomposition may be affecting the gorgonians (canaries of the reef). or another pollutant may be knocking the ceriths off and also affecting the gorgon. :

[Kalanianaole]

Yeah, I forgot the specs: 6 gal eclipse, been running for about five months.

 

Good call on the tan, spiral thingy snails.

Yes, there are sad little snail bodies left in the shells, so no for predation. I had one in there for about three weeks and two very small ones for about two weeks. the large one died tonight, prompting the post. Could be other snail competition, but as far as I know, the nassarius and bumblebee eat detrius, while the cerith and the tinies munch algae (and there seems to be plenty of brown algae in the tank).

 

And since the large cerith died tonight, it's not that decomp that's affecting the gorgon. My nitrates get up to about 10 ppm (or whatever) and I do a 20% water change (about once a week).

 

One other catch...my red finger sponge frag and my red ball sponge also receded a bunch. The ball is out of there now, but the finger has been snipped away almost to where it's attached to the rock. The puzzeling thing to me is my orange finger frag (which sits right next to the red finger) is doing just fine.

 

I don't have an advanced test kit (beyond the nitrates and all that jazz) so I'm not sure what the deal is.

 

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Sun coral = neat.

 

jkm

[tinyreef]

you've got food for them so scratch starvation. altho the nassarius are good ime but the bees are slackers. : pretty but dumb.

 

i'm obligated to make the comment; the tank's a little young for a scleronephthya and sponge. besides a bit small, unless you're feeding (which btw creates another set of dominos).

 

i don't agree with the snipping off part btw. i forgot to mention that. i prefer to let nature run its course. gorgons can shrivel to 1/4 of its healthy fullest and still recover ime. snipping/trimming just subjects the animal to further stress. unless its rtn or a similar rapid deterioration.

 

could be the sponge was exuding a noxious chemical, some animals are less tolerant than others but i've never known ceriths to be exceptionally weak. just exceptionally tasty to hermits. X)

 

i'm a little confused with your finger frag terminology tho. you messed me up a bit there with the various colors and corals and sponges. can you straighten that out for everyone? ???