Keeping Leptogorgia sp.

[reefy em]

Hi all!

I am a graduate student at Texas A&M Corpus Christi and am starting my thesis work with Leptogorgia species found along the Texas coast. We have collected some specimens from the Port Aransas jetties but are having trouble keeping them healthy past a month or so. Since this is a non-photosynthetic species we just cover it up at night and let it get ambient laboratory light during the day. I would like to see if anyone has any suggestions such as flow, temperature, water quality, and food to help them thrive in captivity. We are feeding Marine Snow and replenishing with bay water every week right now and are still seeing tissue loss.

Thanks in advance!

Emily

 

[Travis L. Stevens]

What are your water parameters right now?

 

[Travis L. Stevens]

Also, are you only feeding Marine Snow?

 

[reefy em]

Yes, only Marine Snow every other day (1 capful). It is in a 10 gallon tank with a large airstone right now because we are trying to get other equipment and a larger tank set up. This was just an emergency tank. I don't have my normal test kits but as far as the basics, salinity is 1.027 (bay salinity) temp is 22C (jetty temp at 10ft.). I just need to know the best conditions for them so I know how to set up the big tank.

 

[Jens Kallmeyer]

HI

I don't have any experience with Leptogorgia but with a variety of other azooxanthellate Gorgonians.
1) one feeding every other day is not enough, I feed between 6 and 8 times per day and night.
2) If you only feed one type of food these corals will surely die. As we still don't know what these corals truly need, we can only try to give them as much variety as possible. Try all available food sources, you may also want to take a look at the products of Fauna Marin http://www.faunamarin.de/bedienungsanleitung/FaunaMarin_eng.pdf
3) There is not enough current in your tank. Even if it is just a 10 gal system you will need some more water movement, perhaps a small Seio or something along the line, a powerhead with a hard outlet jet may not be suitable.
4) The weekly water change is not enough, either install some kind of filter or do a 80 % water change every other day. Isn't there any chance you can hook your tank up to a flow through system with water directly from the Sea?

Good luck

Jens

 

[Travis L. Stevens]

Jens definitely has said a lot in a short amount. Also, where are you getting your bay water from? Could it be polluted? After all, it is from a Bay. Besides just keeping these guys, what is the purpose of this thesis. Is there an experiment behind it? Is there a control and variables that you will add or like to add?

 

[reefy em]

I know that the 10 gallon is not optimal, again, it was an emergency set up. I need to know what I need on the mesocosm and other tanks we are going to house them in for studies.

The building is not plumbed for seawater so the water is from Corpus Christi Bay by campus. It's the closest I can get right now and it may not be perfect, but these are growing in the Aransas ship channel which is connected to the bay.

No, this is not just my thesis. I need to know how to keep them in captivity in order to do my experiments on them. I will be doing surveys of where they are found along the south Texas coastline, how turbidity affects them, and what commensalate organisms and bacteria/fungi are associated with them.

 

[Jens Kallmeyer]

HI reefy

what a cool project!
However, how do you want to get some experimental data that have any relevance for application in natural systems when your experiment deviates in about every single parameter from nature?
These gorgs sit on jettys and over the course of the day thousands and thousands of gallons of water pass through them, even if they only catch a fraction of a permill of all particles that come by, they still get much more than they can possibly catch from a cupfull of food every other day.
I think the water you are using is absolutely fine, it may not be superclean, but it is exactly the stuff these corals are living in. However, even when you get a good handle on the flow in the system (and this can be an absolute nightmare just to start with) they will have removed all the useful particles in rather little time. So please do water changes as much as possible. Additionally I think you have to come up with a better (more frequent) feeding schedule and with a greater variety of food.
YGPM with some additional info

Good luck

Jens

 

[billsreef]

Marine Snow doesn't contain a lot of real food, mostly water. Just take a look at the ingredient list I think you'd do much better culturing rotifers and feeding freshly hatchs brine shrimp nauplii and best yet, collect some wild plankton from the area you get your specimens.