Traveling Zoas

[triguy]

Never really had this happen before, so I wanted to hear some thoughts. I have two fairly nice size frags of PPE Morphs that have suddenly changed in appearance due to traveling polyps. They appear to be moving off of the disks and on to the sand and nearby rocks.

One frag has 4 polyps of another paly on it, so I'm wondering if this is the cause for them to completely leave the disk and move. The other colony has probably over 100 polyps on a small disk, which I can now see due to their traveling onto the sand. Is this normal? If not, any suggestions on why this might be happening.

They are not melting, but are they telling me they are unhappy?

 

[Reefer577]

Maybe a pic would help. I keep getting a visual of polyps with feet.

 

[triguy]

Maybe a pic would help. I keep getting a visual of polyps with feet.

I'll take one tomorrow, but I'd say your not too far off. In some areas I can see how they mat or polyp has stretched and are detaching from one area and on to another. And forgot to mention in original post that the polyps did shrink down from nickel size to much smaller before the traveling began.

 

[Reefer577]

Maybe stress or too much light.

 

[dmyers557]

I think they are just naturally trying to grab as much space as possible. I've had mine do this as well.

 

[triguy]

Here is a photo of what the one frag used to look like. Can't even see the disk it is on.

Here it is now.

And here is the other frag with the 4 different palys. Noticed how they have moved onto the rocks. If you look closely, you can see a few polyps that have totally stretched. BTW, these palys had overtaken the four that are now the only ones not moving from the disk.

 

[koll12]

How much water current do you have on them? Have you adjusted that at all ?

 

[Snookster]

I have some paly's that move about. The biggest one just "spawned" 3 new baby's a couple of days ago, and the babies are already almost an inch away.

 

[Scopus Tang]

Classic! I just started a thread on another forum about polyps migrating. I would suspecting lighting first and flow second. Shrinking of the polyps says too much light, movement suggests a flow issue, but could be a lighting issue. How long have they been in your tank? How long in the current position?

On a side note, do those exhibit the characteristic vibrant green mouth of a PE?