Trach. brain not eating

[raoul]

I've been wondering about this. We've had a trach brain for close to 2 years I would guess, I'd need to look through pictures to be sure.

The past 9 months to a year it hasn't eaten anything that I've seen. I've offered mysis when I feed the other things, but there's not really a response.

I went for quite a while believing this brain didn't have feeder tentacles because I'd never seen them. This past year I've seen a few, but they haven't done much.

We normally feed during lights on (our lights usually go out when it's time for us to go to bed), when it was eating it did so during this time. It usually shrinks pretty quickly after lights out, still no feeders extended.

I've been reading that these should be fed a couple times a week for optimal health, I assume it must be eating something since it's not dead, and I have noticed "coral poop" on occassion (at least that's what I think it is).

It continues to exapand during lights on, but it is a bit crowded. We're working on moving it to our other tank, but want to get the calc. / alk balanced in the other tank first.

Questions - what could it possibly be eating? Any ideas on getting it to eat again?

Anymore questions you can think of, please ask
TIA

 

[wantsalotta]

Its eating LIGHT

 

[dbtoys]

ya it eats light and photo plankton

 

[raoul]

I was reading some stuff from A.Calfo (I think) and a few others that said phytoplankton and light weren't enough to sustain them long term. That target feeding them, some recommended up to every other day, was necessary or they would slowly die. They said that shredded meaty foods were a good choice.

We usually feed mysis and flakes for the tank, and it quit taking mysis quite some time ago, and can't catch flake.

Last night I wondered if it was objecting to the type of food, I know nems have preferences, so I wondered if this brain may too.

I took a small piece off of the scallop that was for the nem and laid it on the brain, it did not take long at all for it to eat it up, it also appears to like frozen formula one (thawed of course). I guess it does have a preference. I'm very excited that it finally ate

 

[salt newbie01]

I have had a red and green trach ( the one in my av ) that did very well for 6 months or so. It would eat a piece of raw shrimp or half of a silverside 1-2 times a week. It would swell up to approx 6-7" wide. And then it just stopped doing so well. It only swells to 4" wide now. I don't know why, I have not moved it, haven't changed salt, haven't changed lighting etc. I don't know why it is not doing as well. On the other hand it still looks good - the tissue is nice and puffy and the color is good. The strangest part to me is that it will no longer eat. If I set a piece of food over it'as mouth like I used to nothing happens. the food will just slowly slide off to one side. I hope someone knows what is going on with them because they are really neat corals.

I hope yours will continue to do well for you.

 

[raoul]

The only thing that's changed in our routine is flow (there's more of it) and I tried a different food. Maybe those are somethings you can try.

One of the things they pointed out was smaller pieces of food, not teeny tiny though, but more shredded. They can take in the bigger foods, but may spit them out later and then the aquarist wonders why they aren't doing so well.

Good luck!