Very inflated brain, why?

[Gobie74]

I've had this brain now for about 3 months. He seems to be doing well on the bottom out of the direct light.

Lately it has been getting very inflated. This happens for a while, mostly while the lights are on, then it settles back down to its normal shape.

Can anyone tell me why they do this? Is it something I'm doing wrong? I try to feed it mysis / brine shrimp / krill once a week.

Thanks

 

[elegance coral]

It wants more light. It looks like part of it may be shaded. As long as its feeding it will most likely do fine on the sand. If you don't like this apperance you can try to find a flat spot on the rocks and gently move it closer to the lights. It wont expand as much under bright lights. Just my 2 cents

 

[Gobie74]

More light, ok. Thanks for the quick response.

 

[Faviaphile]

Mine gets more than enough light- (I use mhs) and mine always does that a day or two after it feeds. Sometimes it does around feeding time too... I call it begging Then I'll notice that it shrinks down in size- usually four days after eating and expells waste. I find that my trachies don't love crustaceans, they seem to like marine fish protein better. I give mine a good sized hunk of silverside weekly.

I bet if you kept track of the inflation an deflation you will see a pattern that correlates to your feeding cycle.
Cute brain

 

[elegance coral]

This is my wifes brain. It still has the cycle of expanding and contracting that Faviaphile described but not to the extreme. When it was on the sand it would get huge.

 

[Gobie74]

My thanks to both of you.

 

[seapug]

Yeah, those guys will puff up absorb more light. I've seen one adapted to living under an overhand that would get HUGE-- looked like a flourescent green balloon.