St Thomas placement + care

[TampaSnooker]

I just got my first red St Thomas mushrooms. I've dealt with the more common green and purples quite a bit but these don't seem to want to be in the light as much as the others. Anyone know if they are collected from deeper water or different habitat?
Any suggestions on how much light they will ultimately take? For now, I'm treating them like Yumas and starting them in the corners and caves. Most of the pics I've seen in peoples tanks show them on the bottom but in direct light.

 

[TampaSnooker]

<a href="http://s830.photobucket.com/albums/zz222/tampasnooker/?action=view&current=dsanctithomae.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://i830.photobucket.com/albums/zz222/tampasnooker/dsanctithomae.jpg" border="0" alt="Photobucket"></a>

 

[Timothy McCandless]

tagging along

 

[handfed]

the pic looks more like a calgreni mushroom then a st thomas bubble

 

[TampaSnooker]

why do you say that? I work with both and never seen carlgrenis in this color, nor do they have the same vessicle patterns.
http://reefguide.org/wartycorallimorph.html

 

[TampaSnooker]

and the carlgreni: http://reefguide.org/forkedtentaclecorallimorph.html

 

[pbmatthews]

I've got a collection of different colors of St. Thomas including a 4" red one and I keep mine at the top of my tank right next to my Florida Ricordeas in direct T5 lighting (roughtly 400W of light) and they all do well. I've not noticed any difference based on color.

 

[TampaSnooker]

I think the reds come from deeper water. Mine were freshly collected and may have just needed to acclimate. After watching them a few weeks, they seem to adapt better to light once attached and settled. I've seen several people's photos where they are in bright light. I think that like a yuma, you just have to slowly photoacclimate these.

 

[TampaSnooker]

pbmatthews I'd love to see pics of yours.

 

[April_Sherwood]

I just rec'd these beauties last night, from Coral Morphologic. My pictures definitely do not do them justice and like I said, I just got them last night. The Fuzzy seems to be making himself home on the live rock quite nicely ; )

 

[luisse25]

i have mine in the bottom under 250w mh with t5's....mine is 5 inches big and is actively making babies...heres mine id like to share.....i lost an all red with white bubble tips before due to stress moving it a lot...

 

[TampaSnooker]

Luisse - I was trying to find your thread with the red/blue rhodi and red St Thomas earlier today. How cool you chimed in here today. I was wondering how the rhodi's color held up. Mine have gone all brick red and lost the blue background. Maybe it's the photo but looks like some blue has faded. What color bulbs are you running?
I got one St Thomas with white tips in the group of reds I recently acquired and it is happiest of all of them. In fact, I am about to move it slightly into more light. TheBigTuna (greenhouse farmer) chimed in on my FB page and wanted to know how my efforts at propagation were going. One thing I picked up is that the bubble shrooms don't like to be cut. I"m still trying to deal with getting them into the light! Once photoacclimated, I'm going to try to prop some by constriction with an elastic. Perhaps that will prevent the infection that likely kills the cut ones.

 

[TampaSnooker]

Oh, and great shots. Great specimens.

 

[luisse25]

are u talking about this rhodactis?heres a recent pic that i have.....this is the closest i can get...in the pic its fully expanded so its really stretched out and not as colorful as when its not really expanded...mine stayed its color...it went much more bigger....

i havent tried cutting the red st. thomas...i just put pieces of rocks in its foot and its just gonna try to move and attached leaving a small piece of flesh...right now i have 1 nickel size baby and 2 flesh...

i have colony of green gray st thomas and theyre the more bubbly ones...i have it in my sump so i dont really take much pics of it...i will find a pic of 3 shrooms that i frag off my main colony..its not a fancy color though

 

[luisse25]

u know its funny cause everytime people see my red st thomas they always couldnt believe its a mushroom...they always thought its a bubble anemone cause one of my clownfish host in it...

 

[DeepBlueZoas]

i have mine in the bottom under 250w mh with t5's....mine is 5 inches big and is actively making babies...heres mine id like to share.....i lost an all red with white bubble tips before due to stress moving it a lot...

:bounce1: Bump

Do you still have these mushrooms did you get it from rare reef?

 

[TampaSnooker]

6 years later...

 

[Rx79394]

Lol the last three St. Thomas Mushrooms posts were revived... DeepBlueZoas really wants a St. Thomas.

Can't blame him, I want one now too!!!

 

[Reeferz412]

I have only seen 5-6 red st. thomas in the past two years. Scarce these days.

 

[TampaSnooker]

The collector I used to get them from only does rock/flower 'nems these days. His Riccordea patches all bleached in lower keys and it sounds like he does a lot better collecting 'nems. Colin at Coral Morphologic used to get a lot of nice reds, but I think he's busy being a scientist, artist and coral savior. My understanding is that reds are from 100' or so, whereas Rics and 'nems are 15-30'. Every now and then I'd see red Discosoma Carlgreni pop up from Ric territory.