Display refugium help

[Ron Reefman]

I've been having a hairy algae outbreak in the display refugium. So far it hasn't affected the DT as I think the filter socks and tangs have kept it at bay. I just added an Atlantic tank and some big cerith snails from KP Aquatics. It will be interesting to see how they fair with Hannibal, the red reef lobster. I'll start doing some manual removal today.

SW Florida had a cold front (relatively cold for Florida) go through on Tuesday, so Wednesday a friend and I went collecting on a Sanibel Beach. It was chilly at 9am when we left home, and even cooler at the beach. But the sun came out and by 11am we had taken off our flannel shirts as it was quite nice out. I did forget to wear a hat and now I'm paying for it with a bright red head.

There were tons of Pen shells on the beach and lots of conch egg cases. There was a variety of sponges as well, which is were I tend to find most of the things I collect (inside sponges). We found a more than enough porcelain crabs and a few small pistol shrimp and serpent stars in the sponges we tore up.

I also noticed some chitons, limpets and slipper shells attached to the pen shells and I brought a few of each home. The chitons were small, but they attached to the glass in the tank very quickly and began moving around. I also collected a warty anemone and a hitchhiker anemone which are not photosynthetic but can be kept in an aquarium if you feed them. I found a black rubber/plastic piece off a boat that had a dozen small clams and they also quickly attached to rocks in my tank.

There were some nice purple gorgonians that were very 'branchy' almost to the point of looking a bit like sea fans. I found one with a purple snail (related to the Flamingo Tongue) and my friend found one with a nice little colony of feather dusters attached. We didn't know that's what they were until he got it back in his tank where the feather dusters then opened up. I passed up a couple of gorgonians that had very similar looking clumps of 'stuff' attached but because I didn't know what it was, I didn't want to risk putting it in my tank. Sometimes risky behaviors pay off.

I found a nice clump of red macro algae just in the water's edge which I have picked up before and it has done well in my display refugium, so I figure I'll try some in my shallow reef local tank too. I collected a good size (about the size of a quarter) decorator crab that has hollowed out a tunicate and wears it like a coat over it's carapace. I doubt the tunicate will survive in my tank, but maybe the crab will help keep it alive?

We found a couple of small octopus, one in a pen shell and the other in a sponge I picked up to tear apart. They are so cool to find and I almost feel bad that they have such a short life span. We also found big blue crab and a gulf toad fish that were still alive on the beach and we put them all back in the water and they all swam away.

All in all a pretty nice day. Just enough beach time and collecting to hold me over until our first Keys snorkeling trip in May. Well... not really. I can't wait for the water to warm up so we can snorkel. I have several new places in the Keys I want to explore.

 

[taricha]

Love that account. Super jealous of being able to pick up such neat life like that. Only pics would make it better.
Not much of a display showstopper, but one of my favorite interesting Caribbean critters is my holothuria cucumber.

 

[Ron Reefman]

Yes, living close to the Gulf Coast has proven to be a lot more fun than I expected when I moved here. I thought big sailboat, and we tried that, but it's more work than it's worth. I never even considered an aquarium when I moved, now I have 4!

I'm getting a few shots of things I collected in my tank and my friend took a few out on the beach with his phone and I'm trying to get those as well. So "Coming Soon" I'll have to look and see what species of sea cucumber I got. In the past I've had a couple of the yellow ones from the Keys. And then people see one in my tank and want to buy it. I know I'll be going to the Keys again, so I sell it. But the one in my 125g DT has been with me for more than 3 years.

 

[Ron Reefman]

Here is a small start to photos from the beach collection day.

First is a guy we did NOT collect but actually released back into the Gulf. We found 2 of them, one inside a pin shell and the other in a small branchy sponge. As I understand it, this is about full size for these guys and the only live 18 to 24 months. Some day I may do a screen cover for my 65g shallow/local reef and then try keeping one of these!




This is a purple gorgonian and they do manage to survive on the beach for a while out of the water. Snowbird and vacationing shell collectors often pick these up as souvenirs. But we managed to find 10+ of them that were smaller and yet still nice full fan shaped. This one has something attached to it. I didn't know what it was so I passed on a couple but my friend took one. In his tank they opened up and at first he/we thought they were feather dusters. But on closer examination we think they are some thing else... but what?




Here is a decorator crab I thought might go in my 65g shallow reef tank which I'm making into a Gulf and Keys only local tank. But I decided to put it in my display refugium instead. There is only the Hawaiian Red Reef Lobster in the tank along with some macro algae and a couple simple gorgonians and leather corals. The big white thing with orange spots on it's back is a tunicate. It's 'attached' to the back legs by hooks. It moves pretty quickly and jumps from spot to spot looking like an astronaut doing a space walk on the moon... it's hysterical. It can also jump off tall things (there is a 16" tall gorgonian) and the front of the tunicate opens up slightly because it's attached at the back, and works like a parachute so the crab floats down rather slowly.

The good news is I have a bit of a hairy algae issue in this tank because the lobster won't eat it, but will eat any fish or small snails I put in the tank to eat it. The decorator crab has been ripping the hair algae off things and eating it like it hasn't had food in a week! We'll see how it does long term.