Diodogorgia nodulifera polyps extension mystery

[Mudbeaver]

I didn't know where to put this thread maybe the mod can help me here thank.


I have a Diodogorgia nodulifera

The red dots are where the white polyps retracts . When the branch is not healthy they disapear and the branch waste away.

here you see a few guards polyps on duty , that measure particule concentration, if present they'll entend and soon the others will open.

That in theory goes with strong flows; However!!!!


I was doing my 3 month cleaning of my powerheads ; this is by the way a new tank and its my first time cleaning my system since its new.


Vinegar and baking soda

Then i've put back the powerhead and i hadn't dosed for 5 days because of other issues. The polyps had stayed open, but as soon as i took the powerhead out, they closed. and when i've put them back within 2 hours they were all open again. So the flow but also the movement of the branch seem to be a stimulus for the polyps to open even if food may or may not be present. since i hadn't fed.

I feed

So the question is ; Does direct flow , movement of the gorgonian alone in particular would be sufficient to make the polyps extend regardless of particule concentration.






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[leveldrummer]

Id love to help, but I can barely read that tiny print...

 

[Mudbeaver]

Id love to help, but I can barely read that tiny print...

Its funny i try to put it on 2 and somehow i think someone is playing a trick on me here. Any other sites its on 1 or 2 but i think here they've done something to make my threads unreadable its on 5 now can you read thanks

 

[Sugar Magnolia]

He's being sarcastic.

 

[jdhuyvetter]

Based on the pics, your rock seems to be pretty new. How long has the tank been set up and what are the parameters?

 

[noy]

Flow won't do much. it comes down to the concentration of food in the water column.

This is a non-photosynthetic coral that should be fed at least 2x a day. Best bet turn off the flow and target feed. Its also a larger polyped gorgonian so you can feed it stuff like cyclopeez (frozen and dried) which has a larger protein value (arguably).

I have a thread on feeding these corals.

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2305738

 

[Mudbeaver]

He's being sarcastic.

Well ever since i got operated on my eye i can't see properly and i need to post bigger to see the letters forms, even with glasses it doesn't work the inside of the cornea has been damaged and i need to be able to read my post sorry if it bothers them but :spin2: lol. however i can reread my post bigger and then reduce after that could be done .

 

[Mudbeaver]

Based on the pics, your rock seems to be pretty new. How long has the tank been set up and what are the parameters?

The tank was started dec 27 2013 .

I have no problem feeding the gorgonians it self. The ultramin i'm using is quite effective and she stays open 24/7. But i've stop dosing for a while , because i think my water was being saturated , it became cloudy. So for 7 days i stopped. It happened that i did my powerhead cleaning and the polyps closed when the flow stoped hitting it. And reopend right after i started againg the powerhead . so that why i was posting and asking the question. Would it not be more the movement of the gorgonian cause by the direct flow responsable for opening of the polyps rather than the particule density. By the way nothing will ever grow on that side, i made sure of it. Its a dark side in my tank , made for NPS . The stalactite is for that purpose.

I was wondering if anybody else had observed that kind of behavior as well.

parameters

temp 75 oF
ph 8.12
grav 1.025
nitrates 2,5ppm
nitretes 0
amonia >0,25ppm
Calcium 460ppm
Mg 1260ppm last week ran out of test
Alk 7 dKH
Phophate 0.03 ppm perfect for my fuge and its macro collection
iodine 0.06 good
iron 0.05 low

 

[Allmost]

Flow won't do much. it comes down to the concentration of food in the water column.

This is a non-photosynthetic coral that should be fed at least 2x a day. Best bet turn off the flow and target feed. Its also a larger polyped gorgonian so you can feed it stuff like cyclopeez (frozen and dried) which has a larger protein value (arguably).

I have a thread on feeding these corals.

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2305738

Flow is actually most important factor

how long have you kept yours for ?

some papers :
The effects of flow on feeding of three gorgonians from
southern Taiwan
http://ntur.lib.ntu.edu.tw/bitstream/246246/174259/1/04.pdf


check out the org azoox site ...

 

[Mudbeaver]

Flow won't do much. it comes down to the concentration of food in the water column.

This is a non-photosynthetic coral that should be fed at least 2x a day. Best bet turn off the flow and target feed. Its also a larger polyped gorgonian so you can feed it stuff like cyclopeez (frozen and dried) which has a larger protein value (arguably).

I have a thread on feeding these corals.

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2305738

I understand i also tought that particule concentration was key specially in view that the gorgonian keeps guard polyps half open to check the water. But in view of what happened to me this week i'm a no longer sure thats the whole story anymore. Flow seem to be much more important. Since my concentration had been depleaded greatly and all the polyps were still open when i shut down the powerheads to clean them . Then the polyps closed for lack of flow for the duration of the cleaning about 30 min, then when i put back the powerhead right beside the Diodogorgia nodulifera she reopend within 20 min or so . That was surprising to me. I hadn't feed her, nor dosed the tank for a week now. So that was my question, did simply the flow and the movement of its branches did it. Was it the stimulus for the opening of the polyps. I've started to dose again now that my water is clear again. i alsohave 6 sponges who collectively filter my tank once every 24 hours. 1 cubic cm of sponge filter 5 gallons of water per day, calculating my sponge matter i came to the number of sponge material i have and it gave me enough to come up with this result. They filter my system once per day 230 Gallons of water .

 

[noy]

The reason I say flow isn't that significant is that I have a high flow system - with SPS and the polyps respond to food being in the water column and don't just stay open because of the flow.

I also had a scenario when I went on vacation and my gorgonians didn't get fed for 3 weeks (despite my instructions - that's what happens when you rely on teenagers). When I returned, i had real problem in getting the polyps to re-open despite the flow. I even tried directing powerhead directly at the gorgonian. There was real tissue recession at the tips as a result.

I think that gorgonians that are kept in an environment without food in the water column will "shut down" - maybe to conserve energy and will require a fair amount of coaxing with the right foods to get it to open again. This is regardless of the flow in the system.

I think when we see gorgonians respond to flow I'm just not sure its the flow versus what may be in the water column (rotifers, plankton).

I think flow is important in the sense that you need to have it in order for the system to bring the food floating in the system to the coral. A good flow will increase the food cycled to the coral - too much and your coral may not be able attach the food. The flow will ensure the coral sense whats in the water column.

I read over the Taiwan article on flow. I find it interesting that they use artemia nauplii as the measure of food consumption and basically use a concentrate decrease model as in indicator for food intake. I am not sure this is a particularly good model (hey what do i know) because of the use of artemia. I have played around with feeding artemia (mixed sizes) to DN (Diodogorgio nodulifera) and have observed that artemia wasn't a particularly good food because they are able to wiggle free even after capture. Also, i think when the polyps respond to food its the finer particles that its detecting not something as large as a nauplii (500+microns). I'm not a biologist and really am in no position to refute this article but I'm just sharing what i know/observe as a hobbyist.

 

[jdhuyvetter]

Ammonia >0.25 might be part of it

 

[Mudbeaver]

The reason I say flow isn't that significant is that I have a high flow system - with SPS and the polyps respond to food being in the water column and don't just stay open because of the flow.

I also had a scenario when I went on vacation and my gorgonians didn't get fed for 3 weeks (despite my instructions - that's what happens when you rely on teenagers). When I returned, i had real problem in getting the polyps to re-open despite the flow. I even tried directing powerhead directly at the gorgonian. There was real tissue recession at the tips as a result.

I think that gorgonians that are kept in an environment without food in the water column will "shut down" - maybe to conserve energy and will require a fair amount of coaxing with the right foods to get it to open again. This is regardless of the flow in the system.

I think when we see gorgonians respond to flow I'm just not sure its the flow versus what may be in the water column (rotifers, plankton).

I think flow is important in the sense that you need to have it in order for the system to bring the food floating in the system to the coral. A good flow will increase the food cycled to the coral - too much and your coral may not be able attach the food. The flow will ensure the coral sense whats in the water column.

I read over the Taiwan article on flow. I find it interesting that they use artemia nauplii as the measure of food consumption and basically use a concentrate decrease model as in indicator for food intake. I am not sure this is a particularly good model (hey what do i know) because of the use of artemia. I have played around with feeding artemia (mixed sizes) to DN (Diodogorgio nodulifera) and have observed that artemia wasn't a particularly good food because they are able to wiggle free even after capture. Also, i think when the polyps respond to food its the finer particles that its detecting not something as large as a nauplii (500+microns). I'm not a biologist and really am in no position to refute this article but I'm just sharing what i know/observe as a hobbyist.

If you ever get into that situation again when a gorgonian gets really shabby, take it out of the tank with some water into a jug big enough for it and a small mini powerhead, put some of your food , but very concentrated , 10 time at least the more concentrated the better it works even if it would be consider toxic in a tank it doesn't matter in the jug now you want those polyp extended for it to feed. You want to see polyp extend fast..... its like a fast forward film after one night. What ever part don't open may be damaged beyond repair,so you can cut them off with a stainless scissors, but try Cyclop eeze or similar size zooplankton or substitutes any kind of food stimuly before that. give it 24 h and then you'll know where to cut if you need to. It worked for me before. Anyway thas a trick.

 

[Allmost]

about the "shut-down" thing ... again if you check the azoox site, there are articles [although mostly done on sun polyps or anemones] that show lack of Amino acids can indeed disable the organism's eating ... they wont have energy to open, capture food, and eat it.

there is a Russian method of injecting food in that case ! there is one person on here with good success doing so.

 

[Mudbeaver]

about the "shut-down" thing ... again if you check the azoox site, there are articles [although mostly done on sun polyps or anemones] that show lack of Amino acids can indeed disable the organism's eating ... they wont have energy to open, capture food, and eat it.

there is a Russian method of injecting food in that case ! there is one person on here with good success doing so.

Have you seen the method of using Ultra Pac a synthetic mucus which you can spread on the polyps and wont disperse in the water columb but will stick to what ever polyps you put it on here's the videos. Shutting down your pumps helps too .

<iframe width="854" height="510" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/toI018OtlsM" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

 

[noy]

about the "shut-down" thing ... again if you check the azoox site, there are articles [although mostly done on sun polyps or anemones] that show lack of Amino acids can indeed disable the organism's eating ... they wont have energy to open, capture food, and eat it.

there is a Russian method of injecting food in that case ! there is one person on here with good success doing so.

Actually my example was just to explain why I believe its flow + food that causes polyps to open (vs. just flow).

I checked the site out Azoox site - there doesn't seem to be much activity. A lot of the threads don't have postings for over 1 year.

 

[Aqualund]

Why are we discussing anything besides the "amonia >0,25ppm"

Why are you also dosing/testing/maintaining iodine and iron on a 4 month old tank with organisms that can do just fine without it?

My point is that before you start trying to figure out and advance with this very difficult organism, the basics need to be covered first.

 

[Mudbeaver]

Why are we discussing anything besides the "amonia >0,25ppm"

Why are you also dosing/testing/maintaining iodine and iron on a 4 month old tank with organisms that can do just fine without it?

My point is that before you start trying to figure out and advance with this very difficult organism, the basics need to be covered first.

All good questions actually . The tank was started with a prodibio technilogy

you put it in and 24 h later you can put fish and corals ins. So the tank has still do do some maturing to still even if the process has been accelerated. But the technology has been used succesfully.

My system is a bit more complex because i have it hooked to a 75 G starfire display refugium feeding my 150 G reef tank by gravity. That refugium doesn't contain only the dull and hardy cheato but a collection of more than 20 different species that are not all hardy and requires special attention, iodine is key to some, and iron, manganese must be monitered before dosing. My seahorses are in that tank as well. The GFO reactor is shut of to permit the accelerated growth of theses algaes.

The amonia has no incidence on the topic at all which is the reason and what is the primary stimulus for the opening of the gorgonian polyp, by the way. >0.025 is the very lowest before 0 so i wouldn't panic over that.

And i have no difficulty what so ever with this gorgonian, by the way my question was accademic and i was wondering if any had any ideas as what took precedent the particule density or the waterflow or the motion of the gorgonian branch. In the original OP its all there. Thank you for your input.

 

[Aqualund]

by the way. >0.025 is the very lowest before 0 so i wouldn't panic over that.

If I had any ammonia in my system I would be freaking out. I am surprised you are not.

 

[OoNickoC]

If I had any ammonia in my system I would be freaking out. I am surprised you are not.

I love the research but the thought of pro bio maturing system is jarring to say the least. The presence of any ammonia is bad period, but it depends on what and when the type of testing us done. Instance given, if I tested ammonia while I change out my chemical media and the pumps are off I can get strange readings, it must be a chart over time to determine the actuall readings. Too many times people take a triple check of a short period in the day as a pulse of the tank.