Bubble in Tounge Coral???

rustybucket145

rustybucket145

New member
I have recently gotten my mom involved in keeping a saltwater aquarium. For christmas this year I got her a 55gal setup. She has probably about 50lbs of live rock, several corals that I propagated and gave to her. Everything in the tank looks great and her levels have been 0 since day 1. She has a DSB that was seeded from my established tank and for lighting a 175 Metal Halide Pendant and NO Flourescents for Actinic.

On a trip to the LFS last month she was sold a Tounge Coral. For the last month the tounge coral has been doing 'good' it has been eating regularly. I have only seen the coral 1 time (about a week ago) and in all outward appearance it seemed very healthy. Full polyp extension and the coral was 'elongated'.

Yesterday she called me and said the coral had developed an 'air bubble' on one end. I don't have much experience with the tounge coral but this doesn't seem normal to me. She lives about 3hrs away from me so I got her to take some pics of the coral and email them to me so I could post them here. I would really appreciate any advice that someone could give. Her pics are kinda fuzzy but you can see the 'bubble'.

Thanks to anyone who has any input.

TONGUE-CORAL-001.jpg

TONGUE-CORAL-003.jpg
 
Can anyone think of a forum that this would be better for? Administrators feel free to move this if I have posted in the wrong section.
 
When my plate coral eats it has a bubble in it to. But it is generally the size of the food I feed it ( krill or piece of silverside) Does she have anything "missing" in her tank that this guy could have eaten? I would imagine the tongue coral would feed much like a plate, using the tentacles to pull food into it's mouth. I would ask her to take a quick inventory of fish and inverts, just to see if anything is missing.

Fuzz
 
Just called her, Nothing missing in the tank. She took inventory last night and everyone was accounted for and healthy looking. Here is another photo of the underside of the coral. I apologize for the clarity of the photo. She said it 'looked like the membrane on the underside of the coral had tears or rips in it. This coral has been on a sand bed since it was introduced. So I don't know how these tears could have occurred. I have been trying to instruct her on better ways to photograph her aquarium so hopefully tonight we will get some better pics.

TONGUE-CORAL-007.jpg


She is really freaking out over this as she has grown very close to all the animals/ corals in her aquarium. So any help or suggestions would be GREATLY appreciated.
 
I have a tongue coral, but have never seen that before. My guess is that there may be some type of predator in the sandbed attacking the underside. Pyramid snails or something of that nature?
 
Pic of underside

Pic of underside

Fuzzy pic of underside. I'm not sure exactly what the underside of a Tongue coral is supposed to look like but I assume that it is smooth. This one appears to have some 'rips' in the membrane. You can kinda see it.....

TONGUE-CORAL-007.jpg
 
Im not certain how you catch a pyramid snail, but I have been told by those who had been infected by them that they feed primarily at night. One thing that you can do in the meantime is get that thing elevated off of the sandbed. See if that helps, and then take it from there.
 
I don't think that placing it on a rock would necessarily hurt it. I can't see why that would hurt it, and being on a sand bed would not. If you are concerned about placing it on a rock, I would maybe recommend making a little "table" out of plex or something similar. Maybe just find the flatest area possible.

As far as the pyramid snail ID, I am sure there are photos out there. I know they are extremely small, have a cone-shaped shell and have been known to like feeding on clams inparicular.
 
Yesterday afternoon she took a trip back to the LFS where she purchased the tongue coral. They said that the coral was possibly 'splitting' or reproducing. I have tried to do some research on Tongue coral breeding and can't seem to find any information. The people at the LFS said that "the coral will form a small 'baby' coral inside it and then 'toss' it up and away from the original mother.

My questions:

Did they feed her a load of Bull just to make her happy? (I know LFS's have never done anything like that before)
Do/Can Tongue Corals reproduce Asexually?
If this coral is Dying what should I tell her to look for?
At what point should the plug be pulled and the Coral removed from the tank?
 
That sounds like a load of malarky to me. These things don't get "impregnated". To my knowledge, these do not "bud" or have babies like other corals. It would need to reproduce as it does in the wild, which is near impossible to replicate in captivity. I think you've been duped.
 
I agree 100% sounded like a big load to me. So how do I tell her what to look for? If this coral is dying how will she be able to tell when it is 'over the hill' 'beyond repair' and to remove it from her tank to prevent contamination????
 
I agree 100% sounded like a big load to me. So how do I tell her what to look for? If this coral is dying how will she be able to tell when it is 'over the hill' 'beyond repair' and to remove it from her tank to prevent contamination????
 
I would say that when you see tissue dying away from the skeleton that it is a goner. You can cut a portion of it off and it will regenerate back into a circular form - perhaps not totally uniform, but you will at least save the specimen. I still think you should try moving it off the sandbed for now and see if that helps it any.
 
I've had a tongue coral for a few years and can't say mine has ever looked like that before. It will puff up right after being fed but is not localized like your pic shows.

Other than the bulge, does the coral look normal? Is it eating as it did before? Does the bulge subside at night?

Personally, I would leave it alone and see what happens. Moving it around is only going to stress it more.

ri
 
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