Fcwham
New member
Hi Grandis,
Lots of things to respond to, forgive me if i dont get to all of them in this post, I'll take a few posts to respond to everything.
I do have a system already going. I have 2 30gal breeders that have frag racks for experimental corals. each system flows to its own 20 gal refugia then to its own sump with skimmer. the two systems exchange water but can be cut off if they need to have different conditions for an experiment (temperature or something). They have been running for a long time and have cycled and such.
I could collect the Zoas, I'm collecting in Palau in August I plan on doing that anyway. I am curious though as to what zoax species is commonly found in aquarium zoanthids, I've found 4 or 5 different zoax species in wild collections but there are 2 that are particularly common, I would expect to find them but I'd like to verify that.
I have to disagree with you about the zoax exchange being based on availability in the water. Corals do change symbionts but its mostly changing between % of species that are already in their tissue. Thats kind of a point that could be made by this sort of experiment i guess if its not one you believe to be true already. I will point you toward this paper http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1529-8817.2009.00730.x/full. This research was done in our lab and would strongly suggest that corals in aquariums do not exchange zoax between host species.
The occurrence in zoanthids would be even less likely in my opinion because each zoanthid species seems to associate with specific symbiodinium. that is to say that a species of zoanthus might associate with a few symbiodinium species but those species are unique to that particular zoanthus species, going to a different zoanthus species you would find a different set of 3-5 symbiodinium.
1-3) Stay tuned, this paper is in the works and I'll post more about it after submission. The species dont have names, but we intend to give them names in the near future.
4) mostly gonad tissue and a TON of zoax, I think they are mostly depending on their symbionts and DOM rather than eating lots of stuff (I refer to Z. sansibaricus here, this may not be true for other zoanthids. For reference Z. sansibaricus is one of the most common aquarium zoanthids including Eagle Eyes, Wham'n Watermelon, Radioactive Dragon Eyes ...)
Lots of things to respond to, forgive me if i dont get to all of them in this post, I'll take a few posts to respond to everything.
I do have a system already going. I have 2 30gal breeders that have frag racks for experimental corals. each system flows to its own 20 gal refugia then to its own sump with skimmer. the two systems exchange water but can be cut off if they need to have different conditions for an experiment (temperature or something). They have been running for a long time and have cycled and such.
I could collect the Zoas, I'm collecting in Palau in August I plan on doing that anyway. I am curious though as to what zoax species is commonly found in aquarium zoanthids, I've found 4 or 5 different zoax species in wild collections but there are 2 that are particularly common, I would expect to find them but I'd like to verify that.
I have to disagree with you about the zoax exchange being based on availability in the water. Corals do change symbionts but its mostly changing between % of species that are already in their tissue. Thats kind of a point that could be made by this sort of experiment i guess if its not one you believe to be true already. I will point you toward this paper http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1529-8817.2009.00730.x/full. This research was done in our lab and would strongly suggest that corals in aquariums do not exchange zoax between host species.
The occurrence in zoanthids would be even less likely in my opinion because each zoanthid species seems to associate with specific symbiodinium. that is to say that a species of zoanthus might associate with a few symbiodinium species but those species are unique to that particular zoanthus species, going to a different zoanthus species you would find a different set of 3-5 symbiodinium.
1-3) Stay tuned, this paper is in the works and I'll post more about it after submission. The species dont have names, but we intend to give them names in the near future.
4) mostly gonad tissue and a TON of zoax, I think they are mostly depending on their symbionts and DOM rather than eating lots of stuff (I refer to Z. sansibaricus here, this may not be true for other zoanthids. For reference Z. sansibaricus is one of the most common aquarium zoanthids including Eagle Eyes, Wham'n Watermelon, Radioactive Dragon Eyes ...)
