xenia fast propagation ?

boxerzz

New member
I bought several stalks of xenia on a piece of LR, and each stalk has some branches. The second day the branches got thinner and started to bend over onto the rocks ( propogation process ?) and now I got a few branches attached to the LR from the main stalks. So, what makes them do this ? And if it is propogation, they start on the second day in the tank ? That got to be very fast.
 
In my experience xenia moves very quickly towards a light source, which means it generally climbs live rock up to the top. The stalks will go limp due to stress (or sometimes due to nothing discernable). It's possible the stress of moving it made it go limp, then they simply grabbed on. It grows very fast, I have a few strands of chaeto growing through mine because they landed on it for more than a few hours and it grew over them.
 
Oh, and save yourself some headaches later and try to keep your xenia either already at the top of your rockwork so it doesn't go anywhere or on a piece of live rock surrounded by sand, usually they won't cross sand. Otherwise it will crawl up the rock and leave clones everywhere, which can be a pain.
 
Get ready to start peeling this stuff off by the handfulls. I peal every month. This stuff looks cool..but man...does it grow like a weed!
 
lol....i have mine at the top of my tank on two seperate rocks and it stays right there, i have had it in my tank for over four months, it gets thicker but it dont leave the rock, so far :)
 
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Yes you are right Xenia will move around your tank until it finds a spot it likes. They manage to move faster then you think. Mine were on a rock when I put them in the tank and in a week the rock they came on was clear of them and the three heads were about 2in away. Now they have seteld down but have quadrupled in size. On the good side my other corals don’t seem to care if the Xenia touches them.
 
You guys should get the true blue xenia (cespitularia), it won't grow that fast like xenia and if you do manage to get it growing all over your overflow, tank, etc you can make a lot of cash selling it :D :D :D
 
Mine seem to prefer medium current, pretty high lighting, and of course good water quality. The stuff spreads quickly. Wish my acans would grow like that. LOL
 
I have never seen the blue xenia for sale, anyone know where they have some? And how about some pics from guys who have some.
 
Here are various pics of blue xenia (cespitularia). This variety has glitters on its body which are very noticeable to the human eye. Colors vary from teal to sky blue to almost greenish depending on the light. Some of the pics are mine, but others are from RC members.

If you want more pics, go to the thread called "blue xenia" or something like that.

CIMG2116.JPG


topview_ces.jpg


xenia1.jpg


xenia12.jpg


CIMG2296.JPG
 
that stuff is all over the place i have noticed that it really likes alturnating curents. i have 2 powerheads on my 29 and they alternate every 15 mintures and my xenia has never looked better.
 
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