HELP WITH tiny RICORDEA

[Dendence]

I do not know anything about ricordeas other than they are supposed to be easy to keep.I bought an orange ricordea that is attached to a ceramic disc a few weeks ago.It looked bigger on the website. It is tiny and started to get bigger.It is back to being tiny, a little bigger than a pinhead. The only reason that I know its still there is I can see it when my blue lights are on alone.I had it on the sandbed and it got tiny. I now have it at the top of my rocks about 15" from LED lights to see if it will get bigger. What gives ?
thanks

 

[Ohiomom]

Is it a yuma..sometimes they just shrink away to nothing..I had that happen once and still have no explanation.

 

[Dendence]

no yuma, thanks

 

[ek9vboi]

Unless you acclimated the ric to the lighting, it will stay small till it can get use to the LEDs. My suggestion would to move it back to the sand bed and watch it open up again. I assume the ric is getting too much light and thus it is shrunken.

 

[Dendence]

ok, will try that. How big it is supposed to be ? thanks

 

[Rudolph]

Surely you are exagerating? The coral is the size of a pinhead? Can you post a pic? Where did you buy it? It sounds like the coral fell off and all you have is some sliver of what was a ric.

You should only move it up a few inches at a time. Then let it sit for at least a week or two and if it is improving move it up another inch or two and let it sit. You cannot make dramatic moves like that. You need to give it time.

 

[Dendence]

ok, maybe a large pinhead. It has gotton bigger since i moved it.i would say its about an eight inch
here is a picture on one of those ceramic discs that is about an inch. I got it from Coralprops

 

[Dendence]

Got a better pic with underwater camera

 

[Dukester]

that ricordia looks like it was just cut in two, it also was very very small to begin with. i dont get how a website would try and pass this off as an item ready for sale. did you add the elastic bands or did it come like that? seeing as the elastics are doing nothing you might as well removed them from your tank.

 

[Dendence]

I just put the elastics to hold it to a rock to move it up higher.thanks, i'll remove them

 

[Rudolph]

That is absolutely the tiniest ric I have ever seen sold at a website......a typical size one runs $15-20 on the web and would be about 1" or 1.5". I think the larger the size the better chance of getting off to a successful start. If you can take this one to full size you should pat yourself on the back. Good luck!

 

[CLINTOS]

Was it bigger to begin with, when you put it in your tank?

It look's like a lot of it rotted and left a small piece behind. He looks kind of healthy now, for the most part.

 

[Dendence]

I found a picture from when I got it. Like I said it was tiny then got bigger and got tiny again. You think that it got damaged in the tank ?

 

[Dukester]

yes something happened to it.. it looks to be missing alot of itself.

 

[CLINTOS]

One thing that I noticed from buying a lot of shroom's in different condition's, is that the pic shows some healing of the mouth, but at the same time a mouth that probably recently released some internal rot.

Mouth's are usually tight like zoanthids and playhtoas.

Usually the middle will rot, some time's you get lucky enough that a piece will heal enough to survive and grow.

Pretty rare, but possible, it only take a sliver of a ric to survive. so far from the recent pic it looks small but healthy.

even though I can't see the mouth, it will regrow a mouth, it seems that your tank may be healthy enough to allow it to survive.

strong looking stem, tentacles, over all healing

rot can happen with in day's.

I have the same thing happening with 1 of mine at the moment. bought it with out going to the person house, just met up with the guy, so couldn't really get a good look at it until it was in my tank.

 

[Dendence]

thank you for taking the time to help. Hope that it will survive. I bought 3 from saltwater fish last week and have them in a container so they attach to rocks. They look pretty good and seem to be attached.
How long before I can take them out of the container ? How do I know if they are attached good enough ?

 

[Rudolph]

If they look like they are attached, then gently swish them around a bit in the container and if they don't come off it sounds like they are ready for prime time. I usually don't even try mine until after 2 weeks minimum. If you have a lot of rock work that you cannot move around very easily, they can disappear on you if you don't notice it fast enough. They are very light and it doesn't take much for them to move around once they are free......remember, patience is a virtue.

 

[CLINTOS]

agreed, 2 weeks is not always long enough, but test them, and make sure they are attached. Or they will just fall off the new surface.

 

[Dendence]

thanks

 

[pakirri]

try adding some iodine