gorgonians need help

[vultao1]

I have two gorgonians one red finger and one yellow finger but they havent extented thier polyps in a few weeks now and they have lost most of their skin i moved them into moderate lighting and stonger flow does anyone know if this will help them to recover i really dont want to lose these beautiful creatures

 

[triggerfreak]

Should help. From what i have seen with mine they like strong direct flow. Also try spraying food at them. I spray mine with mysis. brine, dt's, and cyclopeze. I use a turkey baster to spray them with. Do this daily and they should start to recover. Good luck.

 

[dendro982]

I'll second that, flow and food.

Although my red finger gorgonians didn't have this problem, but they are looking good in reflected from glass flow, that slightly springs their branches (150 gph in 6g, withing 8"), and multiple daily feedings (dried Cyclop-Eeze, ZoPlan, anything small you have access to).
The dead tissue can be removed by pipette or turkey baster.

Hope, that they restore their health soon.

 

[vultao1]

thanks for the backup i appreciate all of your advice ive been giving phytoplankton is that alright??

 

[triggerfreak]

Phyto is ok for now, but you need to get some type of invert/coral food for it. Try to feed a varity of stuff not just one thing. You will get better results.

 

[vultao1]

my yellow finger has finally sent out one of its polyps good sign i hope

 

[cmsargent]

If they haven't extended thier polyps in weeks (by few do you mean 3 or more?) and are loosing flesh these might be to far gone to recover. At some point the gorgs will no longer have the energy to extend thier polyps and then are doomed to starvation.

Is the flesh falling off all the way to the brown gorgonia center (twig-like skeleton part)? If so your best chance of saving them is to frag them off above the receeding flesh.

Try to put them in strong flow...lighting doesn't matter to these.
You also need to feed them something other than phyto. Most larger gorgonians don't eat phyto and if the do it's not enough to sustain them for long. They need a meaty food like cyclopeze, daphnia, or bbs. I'd feed by squirting the food directly over the goronian. Add small amounts every 5 mins or so to keep food suspended around the gorg for 30-45 mins. I do this twice a day for mine. Since yours aren't eatting I'd try to do this 3-4 times a day for the next week or two. Once they open and are feeding then you can drop back down to 1 or 2 feedings a day.

Good luck

 

[dendro982]

vultao1:
I'm not giving phytoplankton, only zooplankton and substitutes (dried cyclop eeze from MOPS (particles 800 micron or less - crushed or young crustaceans), ZoPlan (particles size ~50-250 micron), the second change of the water from thawing mysis, marine cousine (the first water, mysis was thawing in, pollutes the tank water too much).

The good articles about these gorgonians requirements, are: Toonen , flake food recipe as an option, mounting and fragging .

cmsargent:
Are you keeping filtration and water movement off during feeding?
My water flow is always on (Nano-Cube 6), and food recirculates (settling on the pump's intake too ). Would like to make feeding and filtration more convenient.
And, out of topic, do you know others non-photosynthetic gorgonians, available in trade, other than Caribbean Diodogorgia nodulifera? I did the search, not too much of Indo-Pacific kinds, sometimes they are listed and non-photosynthetic, sometimes - not. I hadn't seen them in LFS, or, may be, wasn't able to distinguish them from photosynthetic. Just curious.
Thanks.

 

[cmsargent]

Hey Dendro. I leave the powerheads on while I feed I don't have any mechanical filtration on this tank so no filters to turn off. I tend to feed a bit and then come back 5-10 mins later feed a bit more and then another 5-10 mins after that I use the turkey baster to blow off all the rock, resuspend any food that has settled out, and blow the detritus in to the water column. For the morning feed I'm usually in a hurry so I just dump all the food in at once and run.


Other species I've seen fairly commonly are the Swifta sp. gorg. It's orange with red polyps sometimes called the orange tree gorgonian. I also see red sea fans and the blueberry gorg now and agian. These are both much harder to keep though and usually are in pretty bad shape when they make it the the LFS. Every now and again I'll see a Euplexauria sp. mostly these are red or purple. None of my LFSs get gorgs in one a regular basis but several of them do get some in occassionally. One of my LFS gets the sea fans in fairly regullarly but almost never sells them and they slowly die in his tank. Kinda sad to watch.

 

[vultao1]

well my yellow finger has extended another 2 polyps i have them both in strong flow and have also started to do night feedings i heard that they perfer to feed with the lights off.And i am going to start shutting down my filter during feedings. ive also noticed copods crawling on my gorgs is this a bad thing?

 

[dendro982]

vultao1:
The flat ones, like these (the big in the middle)?

These isopods made burrows in the chili coral, but on gorgonian they were for 2-3 weeks, then their numbers lessened.
I had wrasse for controlling them in 6g tank, but he overgrown tank, and had to be removed. You can find threads on the subject by search for isopods -Cirolanid.

cmsargent:
I tried with only occasional filtration for a months, a lot of debris was collected under the rock (main food - cyclop-eeze, may be teaspoon for 6g tank a day, for one diodogorgia, one small chili and some sun coral babies). After adding the second, presumably diodogorgia too (on the photo above), infected tank with micro worms. Reduced feeding to ~1/3 or teaspoon, made the main food ZoPlan, with addition of Cyclop-eeze, did FW dip, and changed filter floss daily or every second day. Still a lot of detrius collected after a week:

here- debris and some inhabitants (side of the tank):

Both diodogorgia, new- right, turbo-snail turns it all the time, hetre - side view:

Front view of the new red finger gorgonian:

Have no idea what else to try for removing or reducing debris. Cutting feeding is not good, only a temporary measure.

About other non-photosynthetic gorgonians: is the bluberry one - Paramuricea, and the red sea fans have a flat shape? Do you have Latin names, by any chance, search gives very variable results by common names, if not much troubles? Thanks.

What kind are you keeping? I had seen your tank in the Gallery, but couldn't identify this one. Any new arrivals?

 

[BFG]

Have you tried Reef Nutrition product? They have a product for Seafan and Gorgonia, I'm using it too for mine.

 

[vultao1]

they look like those little guys with all the legs nothing like the flat ones.And thanks bfg for the advice ill check the lfs for that reef nutrition product

 

[dendro982]

Sorry for being unclear, I meant them, with legs, they are flattened top to bottom - isopods, as opposed to amphipods, flattened from the sides.

 

[cmsargent]

Hey Dendro

Nice tank! I'lll try to get some pics of my tank up soon. I'm actually moving this month so the tank isn't going to be is shape for pics for awhile. It's just a local move so I'm hoping everything will survive.

The blueberry gorg is a Guaiagorgia sp. As for the sea fan they are the ones who grow in flat shapes with lots of small interconnecting banches, sometimes look like lacey fans. I think there are a couple of different species...have to look some more for scientific names of those.

Just saw a reference to this book:
Soft Corals and Sea Fans
By K. Fabricius and P. Alderslade
Anyone have it?

I also have quite a bit of detritus that settles out in my tank. It just blow it off the rocks with a turkey baster and stir up up in the sand occassional (only stir the very top layer of the sand). I don't mind the detritus too much. I've actually read that detritus is a good food souce for small poyped gorgs as it contains lots of bacteria and microscopic invert larvea. So I kinda look at the detritus as another food source not something to be removed.

 

[dendro982]

Thank you, cmsargent.
The only thing, that bothers me with detritus and dissolved organics - a significant raise of nitrates and phosphates. Have to do considerable water changes. Working on improving filtration, that is problem for Nano-cube.
Good luck with the moving! Hopefully, there will be no problems.

 

[vultao1]

i checked my lfs but didn't find that reef product but i'm going to try out kent marine coral diet for fine filter feeders label says good for gorgs so going to give it a shot.

 

[dendro982]

I'm not insisting , but: Try to give in addition to this something of the 250-600 micron range (manufacturer should have these data on their website, or web search on product name and a word micron will find this), in 5x more, then recommended, and at least twice daily.

I tried the old product - ZooPlex and for other corals - phytoplankton-based CromaPlez and Micro-vert (not for gorgonians - Toonen's article ) . These gorgonians have the big polyps and can take the bigger food.

See for yourself:
Mine, eating ZoPlan and finest mysis particles:

Cyclop-eeze (for a smaller polyps, can be crushed):

A lot of food is needed to stuff all these bellies

 

[vultao1]

thanks dendro ill take any advice i can get im only about four months into reef aquariums but im really enjoying it.I'll try something a little bigger.I am seeing improvment in my yellow finger.and ive added another powerhead for more flow.

 

[dannyfromholland]

Great pictures Dendro off the feeding never seen such detailed ones!