Finally found a nice gig!

[jscarlata]

Well after many months of searching I found a nice gig at manhattan aquariums. They had a tank full of haddonis and gigs Nd I've kept my eye on this one for two weeks. It looked very good in the store and the price was right so I took it home yesterday. So far it seems good. It never did the inflate/deflate dance, and it opened up about half the size it was at the store. It's color looks even better in my tank than the store. At the store it was almost all brown with some green developing on the tentacles closest to the mouth. In my tank under 50% lights it was very green with some other coloring as well, it has a nice sheen/luster to it as well. Last night right before ligts out the mouth was closed up tight. In the darkness it's still inflated but curled up
I'm optimistic, but we all know time will tell.
Here are some pics, mind you these are iPhone pics do the colors are not accurate, it's all the
Lighting and no white balance on the iPhone.

 

[Winwood]

I don't know if there is anything to it, but that color morph has always seemed a bit hardier to me. I have gotten two of those to live, but have never had success with any of the really bright colored ones. Best of luck.

 

[jscarlata]

Thanks! So far it seems good. It's maintaining it's shape and the tentacles are elongating. It's now about 1/3-1/2 the size it was in the store, but I have a lot more random flow on it than the store. Coloring is definitley green, not brown, but under hints if blue or purple. Could just be the first layer of zoos growing, givin it that luster. Time will tell. But it surely is not brown, in the store it was brown, with a hint of green...

 

[elder luis]

wondeful anemone!

 

[jarrod13]

Congrats!!

 

[jscarlata]

Thanks everyone. Two days and so far so good. It has settled its foot inside a crevice of rock and overall appears happy. It's holding itself up very well and has eaten small bits of mysis.

Pics are iPhone so the colors here are not 100% what it looks like

 

[Reefvette]

Just an fyi your sebea or lta might be stressing out the gig or vice versa looks for someone to be on the move. Gigs are stronger then ltas or sebeas. They are solitary anemones most of the time.

 

[jscarlata]

That's not a sebae or an LTA, it's a football sized elegance coral, but thanks for your advice anyway. The other coral is a galaxy that I need to re-home. All the gig has done so far is move slightly off the branch rock he came on. It was neat, I had a gap between 2 base rocks right in the cove I setup for a nem months ago. The nem I got was attached firmly to a piece if branch Rock in the store which made the whole transfer/acclimation a lot easier. Inwas able to fit the branch rock into the crevice between the two base rocks, it was a perfect fit! Now the nem simply walked further down the branch, it has it's foot on the branch, but it's in the crevice btw the base rocks, so it seems like its staying put for now.

 

[Reefvette]

Thats an elegance holy moly. Wow

 

[jscarlata]

Lol, ya it's huge. Gonna need to find a new home for it at some point

 

[Reefvette]

Thats crazy i thought it was a nem!

 

[jscarlata]

Haha...nope
When I got it, it was maybe a baseball and a half, now it's an nfl sized football when fully open, it takes several hours for it to open all the way. My clowns have never tried to go in it either...they prob won't go In the gig, but in time I thi k they will. My female clown has been moving her sleeping spot closer to the nem since Friday, but hasnt checked it out too closely yet. I don't want them to bother it just yet anyway

 

[KCthe I inTeam]

Congrats on the nem and WOW what an elegance coral looks amazing haha.

 

[jscarlata]

thanks everyone, so far the gig seesm to be settling in fine. It hasnt shrunk or deflated at all, it ate some bits of mysis and shrimp that fell in it during feeding time yesterday. So what can i do for it to make sure its got everythign it needs other than nice random flow, and the lighitng i have. will it benefit from small item frequent feedings of mysis and other small fish foods, or less frequent larger item feedings like shrimp or silversides? any additives that i can soak the food in other than selcon or vitamin c? I want this guy to have the best chance..

 

[cali9dub]

Don't feed it silversides. Some can be bad and kill your anemone. I feed my gig small pieces of salmon soaked in secon and mysis shrimp.

 

[jscarlata]

Starting to stretch out a little..))

 

[jscarlata]

New pics and a video. We are now into week 2, so far so good. It had now opened up fully to what I recall seeing I the store. It eats when food falls on it or is placed In it, I get the impression that it wants live food. Whenever I put a piece of shrimp or mysis on it, It's reaction is instant, the tentacles nearest the piece I food pounce on it, but then as if it realizes its not a live item, it gingerly brings the food to its mouth, this could be normal for all I know.... Color seems to be improving with
Most tentacles showing enter green, or a bluefish gray.





Video:
http://i263.photobucket.com/albums/ii152/jscarlata/357b4b22.mp4

Flow is provided by 3 6055's on a 7096 controller set to sequential random flow.

 

[D-Nak]

New pics and a video. We are now into week 2, so far so good. It had now opened up fully to what I recall seeing I the store. It eats when food falls on it or is placed In it, I get the impression that it wants live food. Whenever I put a piece of shrimp or mysis on it, It's reaction is instant, the tentacles nearest the piece I food pounce on it, but then as if it realizes its not a live item, it gingerly brings the food to its mouth, this could be normal for all I know.... Color seems to be improving with

Looks good. Mine eats in the exact same way you describe. It's not fast by any means, and I don't see the food actually enter the mouth since it quickly covers up the food then pulls it towards it mouth, essentially folding on top of itself. I do see the mouth expanding to accept the food, so I assume it's eating it.

 

[jscarlata]

Cool! I watched mine closely and what I see is the mouth not really opening but rather inflating and engulfing what is brought to it. The mouth starts to balloon up before the food is brought to it. What happens next i cant see, same as you. I'm wondering if we were to feed them a live fish, would they close
More rapidly, I have a suspicion that the live food wiggling around would
Provoke a slightly different response, but, as this is my first gig, I have not a clue as yet, but once I surpass the month mark with this one, I may try.

 

[BonsaiNut]

Cool! I watched mine closely and what I see is the mouth not really opening but rather inflating and engulfing what is brought to it. The mouth starts to balloon up before the food is brought to it. What happens next i cant see, same as you. I'm wondering if we were to feed them a live fish, would they close
More rapidly, I have a suspicion that the live food wiggling around would
Provoke a slightly different response, but, as this is my first gig, I have not a clue as yet, but once I surpass the month mark with this one, I may try.

Yes it will provoke a different response, but it would also be a much higher energy cost to the anemone. Your anemone has two different types of cnidae - the capsule type organelles that fire when they are triggered with the proper stimuli. The spirocysts fire a little barbed hook to grab and hold prey (the stickiness of anemones) and nematocysts fire a sting-like thread that injects toxin. These are one-shot cells - when an anemone uses them they have to be replaced before they can be used again. Generally, a clown anemone gets most of its energy from its zooxanthellae, followed by uptake of dissolved organic matter in the water and / or passive organic particles. Only rarely (extremely rarely) does a clown anemone in the wild capture prey. You can grow a S. gigantea from the size of a dime to 14" diameter with nothing other than sunlight and whatever it can randomly pick up from the water column. Be careful about trying to feed too large food particles, or too frequently. It is not a garbage disposal. If you try to feed something too large it will try to ingest it, and the end up spitting it out - possible fouling your water and costing your anemone a lot of energy it has to replace. As long as it is eating - even small food particles - you are doing fine.