Nlangan
Member
Hi guys,
Tank is a year old this month, one of my hitchhikers from my Florida live rock was a pincushion urchin. I believe it is Lytechinus variegatus - looks like the picture anyway. I have really enjoyed watching this fellow rove around in my tank, but last couple of days I have observed odd behavior. He doesn't seem to be feeding. Normally he orients himself so his "teeth" are against the glass/rock surface but now he has stuck himself sideways to the glass and just twirls around. In the picture, the top (anus) is at 8 o'clock and the bottom (teeth) is at 2 o'clock. He is just spinning around clockwise, occasionally falling off the glass. Last night he had some debris in his spines - which is more common than not. I removed a live snail, and now he has nothing in his spines. My water parms are fine and none of my other inverts are showing any sort of distress (I have a longspine urchin, skunk and blood cleaner shrimps, peppermint shrimps, brittle star, lettuce nudi, SPS and LPS, several types of snail). I dosed a little iodine this morning - in case that was it. There is no obvious improvement so far.
I don't know how old he is but he was smaller than a US Quarter a year ago, So I'd guess not much more than a year old. Anyone know lifespan for these guys?
http://reefcentral.com/forums/picture.php?albumid=4253&pictureid=29181
Tank is a year old this month, one of my hitchhikers from my Florida live rock was a pincushion urchin. I believe it is Lytechinus variegatus - looks like the picture anyway. I have really enjoyed watching this fellow rove around in my tank, but last couple of days I have observed odd behavior. He doesn't seem to be feeding. Normally he orients himself so his "teeth" are against the glass/rock surface but now he has stuck himself sideways to the glass and just twirls around. In the picture, the top (anus) is at 8 o'clock and the bottom (teeth) is at 2 o'clock. He is just spinning around clockwise, occasionally falling off the glass. Last night he had some debris in his spines - which is more common than not. I removed a live snail, and now he has nothing in his spines. My water parms are fine and none of my other inverts are showing any sort of distress (I have a longspine urchin, skunk and blood cleaner shrimps, peppermint shrimps, brittle star, lettuce nudi, SPS and LPS, several types of snail). I dosed a little iodine this morning - in case that was it. There is no obvious improvement so far.
I don't know how old he is but he was smaller than a US Quarter a year ago, So I'd guess not much more than a year old. Anyone know lifespan for these guys?
http://reefcentral.com/forums/picture.php?albumid=4253&pictureid=29181
