Oculina Robusta, will cyclopeze keep it alive?

[dogstar74]

I have a colony of Oculina Robusta that was taken from some live rock cultured in florida. I would really like to keep it alive, but read that it's mostly non-photosynthetic. In the middle of WY I'm kind of land locked, so the best I can do for smaller food is Cyclopeze. Would this be sufficient to help it do it's best?

Thanks,
Aaron

 

[smsreefer]

Do you have a pic ?
What I found shows they like med-to high light and the pic looks like a cluster I had that came in on some Caribbean rock 20 yrs ago that grew until I took the tank down.

What you have may not be the same though. IDK.

 

[username in use]

This is from advanced aquarist. I would say that cyclopeeze will be taken readily, but you may want to vary it also. Being that the polyps are larger, you can probably use mysis or mini mysis as well as blood worms, brine shrimp, chopped krill and maybe even pellet foods.

Oculiniids

Oculina is a group of stony corals occurring in seas throughout the world. The family Oculiniidae also includes the more familiar Galaxea corals which are regularly available to aquarists. Oculina species are mostly non-photosynthetic with certain species being facultative heterotrophs meaning that they may or may not occur with zooxanthellae and they may experience seasonal fluctuations of zooxanthellae densities. Many species of Oculina are commonly found associated with deed sea reef formations and at least two species are commonly encountered in shallow water environments of the West Atlantic.

Oculina robusta has a thick, tree-like growth form. The conspicuous polyps are retracted in this photograph.

Oculina robusta is an unusual coral which prefers turbid shallow water environments. O. robusta is only found in Tampa Bay and the western coast of Florida and as a result it is commonly imported on the live rock which is cultured in the area. The species grows very sturdy, tapering branches from an even wider base. The large corallites have protruding rims and they are tightly spaced towards the branch tips and widely spaced towards the base. The color is a uniform dark brown with a surface that appears almost shaggy when the polyps are fully extended.

 

[DLANDINO]

Can I revive this. I am curious as to the outcome of this animal. I purchased a small frag of this coral, not knowing what it was, other than it was an interesting polyp pattern that I had never seen before. It was in a project tank and the LFS had no idea about it either. Anyway, mine has been doing well and is growing. It has a much more dense polyp extension now that I have been keeping it and I am happy about the subtle colors that the polyps exhibit. Here is a pic of mine. This is a few weeks old now and looks much better at this point.

 

[noy]

Cool looking coral.

Not familiar with this particular coral but from the photo its seems like its got feeding tentacles loaded with nematocysts. If the center of the coral is the mouth then it may be able to handle some fairly large foods - might even do frozen brine.

I would suggest feeding with different foods (cyclopeez - frozen and dried, brine/brine nauplii, coral foods like reef roids) and see what you get the best response (tentacles capturing or sticking to the food and bringing it to the coral's mouth).

Post a video.

 

[Trichome]

I would love to get my hands on some of this coral.

 

[velvetelvis]

I don't keep O. robusta, but I do have three frags of what I'm 99% sure are Oculina diffusa. I can tell you that diffusa is one tough coral. Mine eat cyclopeez, and even smaller bits of Reef Frenzy.