Duncan Help

Tomorrow I will post a picture of mine. The two heads are about 3 inches when extended. My comment to you is get them off the sand. The bottom head looks ****ed its so close to the sand it can't sweep much. Honestly never seen these in nature but would have to assume they grow on rocks and not sand. I have mine mounted to marble placed high in high flow and light. Had them 2 months no issues. My last tank I went to Walter reed for the summer of 2011. Found my Duncan's in the sands after almost 4 months. Literally no light, my neighbor just added tap water to top off. Came home and saw them. Put them off the sand and they made a full recovery. 4 months of being closed with no lights. Granted I think they were eating pods. Anyways relax. It's rare you read a thread of my Duncan's died for no reason. Brandon.
 
So i was recently visiting a friend who suggested that I dip ol' dunc in iodine. When I did this I had several little amphipod looking things come out of the skeleton. Here is a pic if someone could identify for sure this is amphipod. I have dipped ol' dunc twice in three days time and these things keep coming off every time i dip.
 

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My duncan believe or not stayed dorment for over a year until I set up a 37 gal reef with much less lighting. Now it open all the time, people would tell me to toss it that its dying, but I refused to throw it away. Glad I didnt, I think it was my MH.
 
The cleaner shrimp never goes near ol' dunc. I also moved to a frag rack in my tank to get off the sand for now. Been there for about a week now and no signs of getting better. I think it's officially dying off.
 
thats a huge amphipod...
just leave the coral alone, it will come back out when its ready...they are very hardy corals. ive seen mine stay retracted for a week or more...if your tank is stable and the rest of your livestok is ok, then keep it simple and assume all is well and the duncan will open when its ready...
 
I thought about lighting which is why i moved him, but he came from a tank with very intense led lighting similar to my own. I was just walking by the tank and noticed the skeleton hollowing out. I pulled from tank to inspect and everything fell out of one of the heads and boy did it stink. Also before he went in he was happy under the same lighting mid reef. I wish I knew what else went wrong other than the obvious.

Will and can amphipods kill coral directly, or do they just bother them causing them not to eat hence killing them off?

After lights out on occasion he will look like the pic i posted earlier, but not full extended by far. As far as cleaner shrimp goes, i have not seen it on ol' dunc except while feeding before this all happened, which at that point dunc was out and doing well.

Everything in my tank is doing great including two other euphyllia's. Water parameters all check out on every test.
 
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I wouldnt give up on him, sounds like the same issue I had with mine. Bad thing is he might not ever come out under your lights like mine did. Once I moved him to the PC on my 37 gallon he opened within a day or so.


GiGalo said:
I thought about lighting which is why i moved him, but he came from a tank with very intense led lighting similar to my own. I was just walking by the tank and noticed the skeleton hollowing out. I pulled from tank to inspect and everything fell out of one of the heads and boy did it stink. Also before he went in he was happy under the same lighting mid reef. I wish I knew what else went wrong other than the obvious.

Will and can amphipods kill coral directly, or do they just bother them causing them not to eat hence killing them off?

After lights out on occasion he will look like the pic i posted earlier, but not full extended by far. As far as cleaner shrimp goes, i have not seen it on ol' dunc except while feeding before this all happened, which at that point dunc was out and doing well.

Everything in my tank is doing great including two other euphyllia's. Water parameters all check out on every test.
Click to expand...
 
I guess all you can do it set it in a likely spot and see what happens. Mine hates being moved around and sulks for a while. It also got a bit retracted when growing new heads, however never to the degree your Ol Dunc is. It's possible all the dipping and moving about are just irritating it more. I don't think there is anything more you can do but just let it be and see if it recovers.

Hopefully it will! Duncans are cool.
 
my duncan I got jst a couple days ago.....has 3 heads...one head i figured was dead cause you could see half was straight skeleton. soon as i got it in my tank not only did the 2 good heads comletely blow up....but I will bet within a week the half dead head will revive...has already put flesh in the skeletized area's...now if you could just point me toward the testicles i can tell if it's male or female(sry...couldn't help it lmao)
 
LOL hillbilly! ol'dunc is definitely ded. Yes it was GE Silicone II and even though the package does not list a mold agent and says its 100% silicone, it does have a mold resistance agent, which is ultimately the cause IMO.
 
Duncan's are tough! Run some carbon just incase there is something in the water. Otherwise just wait. Get nervous if you see obvious tissue loss.

The only coral to survive my 55 gallon going cryptic after the Halloween blizzard in '11 was the Duncan colony. EVERYTHING else melted away.
 
Yeah, he's not officially dead until there is NO remaining polyp tissue at all, only skeleton. It is amazing how things can come back sometimes.
 
All tissue oozed out of the skeleton. I assumed this was bad and ded. There was nothing left of tissue, it was all brown, stinky, and oozing out. Just a skeleton. I have been running carbon and everything in my tank is doing great so I did not think it was water quality.
 
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