Songes and Gorgonians

[djmuzzi]

Sorry to post this here but there doesn't seem like many responses are in the specialty forums these days.

I am looking to add some color and diversity to my tank & would like to add some sponges and maybe a gorgonian. I have great flow thrououghout & I do feed phyto.

I was wondering if anyone has had luck with the common gulf of Mexico varieties of either.

In particular, I was looking at the Purple Feather Gorgonia, Pseudopterogorgia bipinnata

& this tree sponge

 

[Jens Kallmeyer]

HI

The P. bipinnata is easy to keep, likes a lot of flow, preferably waves. Growth is reasonably fast (ca. 1" per month) and they are easy to propagate. They are photosynthetic but like to be fed additionally, I am using a mix of UltraMIN and UltraCLAM of Fauna Marin, Cyclop Eeze and live BBS every day.
Can't tell you anything about the sponge, never had one. But I haven't heard of anyone having long-term success with those.

Best wishes

Jens

 

[djmuzzi]

Cool Thanks for the info!

 

[whaler1582]

tree sponges are easy to keep as long as you don't have them touch the air and you don't have any micro bubbles in your tank. a guy that i work with at the LFS has kept the same sponges for years. i have had some for almost a year now with no problems. if you are collecting them yourself, go for it, but only get the tree sponges to be safe because some sponges can be bad for your tank.
Josh

 

[djmuzzi]

are the tree sponges non-photosynthetic?

 

[smy168]

most sponges are not photosynthetic, they function as a filter and feed off particles in your aquarium, here are my sponge and gorgs, i dose phyto every 3 days and feed minced mysis ever 5-6 days as well as Kent Marine Zoomax every other week to keep my water nutrient rich.. Gorgs eat a variety of meaty foods and some are photosynthetic. My sponge has zoanthis swifitis and is about a year old and the gorgs come from my other systems and are about 1.5 to 2 years old.

Red Sponge w/ Zoanthis Swifitis

Purple Gorg

Yellow Gorg

My baby..Orange with Red Polyps

good luck

 

[djmuzzi]

That is amazing! Where did you get them?

 

[smy168]

Got them awhile ago, you should do a search to find what you want, though Garf has a great selection of gorgs and from what I hear their specimens are always super healthy.

http://www.garf.org/TREVORHOME.html

 

[djmuzzi]

I can never find where the For Sale section is besides just the Reef Janitors & Grunge.

 

[Paul B]

All these gorgs are easy to keep, I have had them for a few years, some almost ten. The purple one on the right is also hardy and a nice color. They do need current.

This purple one under the fire clown looks almost the same but it is a little thicker.


It is a frag from another one in the tank and it grew there on it's own where the "Parent" was touching that rock.
paul

 

[sunfishh]

Smy your orange with red polyps is amazing

 

[dzhuo]

i have been trying to find photosynthetic gorgonians or sponges for sometime now. everytime i encounter one of such, i can't tell whether they are photosynthetic or not. is there a way to tell? i have been told that if the polyps are NOT white, it's photosynthetic but it doesn't seem to be true at all. any idea?

 

[masterqaz]

the purple whip that you have in the pic is quite easy to keep. Most gorgonians cant tollerate moderate to high lighting for algea grows on them. Not the case with that one, it has the ability to fight off algea which makes it "Semi-aggressive" and it is photosynthetic. The tree sponges are alright though air will kill them like already stated, as will to much light (algea growth). I also believe that if a red tree dies in a tank it also "nukes" the tank (depending on size of either or)