Is my cucumber too big

[Mudbeaver]

This is my Tiger Tail (Holothuria sp.) . It never split, and i'm wondering why? Does anybody have a reason why they do or if it can be triggered, lol. At 22" long, and 1" wide.

Still growing at 14" on this one

And growing this was months ago

Now one early morning i was able to measure him when he was totally outside the rockwork at 22" in lenght I'm concerned.

Not normaly toxic for a tank, they're usually smaller . Now if this one where to die , then what....He's in a 150G tank, and the sooner he split the better , i'll give away the second part lol. He's very good cleaner, i'm just not sure if its normal to be that big. Anybody have one like that.

I write big for my iphone friends

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[650-IS350]

I had mine to almost a foot or so, one day it just split. its been thru a couple tank crashes or issues.

 

[Stevenliu9]

In my experience, they split under stress- animals reproduce when the environment is not favorable. The fact that they keep growing without splitting shows they like the vacation they are taking in your tank !

 

[Mudbeaver]

Ok i found a good article and from what i've red it'll split if reproduce sexually if condition are bad and will split(reproduction asexually) if it has enough food.

My tank is a 150G with a cuke that is 22" going for 24" i'm not sure if my tank can ever produce enough food for this guy...... you know what i mean.... When i got it it was a 16" and it was a fairely new tank. So can i ever hope for him to split.

This is the article very interesting. To get to the good part ; control.F "reproduction" and you'll find the text.

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2003/1/inverts


Actually here's the quote;

"Holothuria atra is an Indo-Pacific species that is capable of asexual reproduction (fission) when well-fed, but appear to switch to sexual reproduction when stressed. Thus, spawning in the aquarium for this species is an obvious sign that they are not being kept under ideal conditions. H. atra are found exclusively in regions with fine sandy sediments and small coral rubble, and are a nonspecific detritivore. They ingest sand particles whole, digesting away the organic coating and associated detritus before defecating nice clean sand (see photo). Photo A Nilsen"


I write big for my iphone friends

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[Mudbeaver]

Hope is here

Hope is here

Well it may be happening now, i haven't seen him in 4 days now, and from my book, cukes can hide for a month while splitting the bigger they are the longer it takes for them to reform a mouth or an ........ss and be able to function. One of the reason they need that extra food for the journey....

If you call splitting yourself a journey.... but anyway. So no sight of hime yet! In the off chance that he's dead i've put an extra bag of carbon in the sump, and be praying for split ends lol.

 

[BeanMachine]

I had one for maybe 3 years, split a couple times and I would give them away. The "babies" were maybe 3 or 4 inches, and the largest it got was maybe 18". I can't help you on the splitting aspect though.