Life of cucumber continue:
Back side of the pink and green filter-feeding cucumber Pentacta anceps:
Behavior in a new tank - moving into position, facing flow:
This new tank was with higher light (7w/gal PC, 12" depth), golden SS cuke was hiding most of the time, when the lights are on:
In previous tank, 4-5W/gal, same depth, it was at open more frequently.
End of pictorial.
Where to get them:
LFS, summer time. Some stores favor invertebrates - check around. Cost - CND$20-35. Golden is more common, could be even of the size 1/2" diameter, 1.5" long. Eventually grows may be 6-7" long, could be more.
I asked at forums, how to distinguish golden SS cucumber and yellow spiky FF cucumber (topic of the thread) - they said that the last has very long spikes and is really small, more bright yellow than golden.
Feeding of the pink FF one:
graveyardworm, I remember you from Dendronephtya study group, you know how to feed filter feeders. Any food you have for them should be good.
Locally most of the recommended food sources were unavailable (first time seen Oyster eggs for sale only today, and CND$64 for a small jar, not the smallest, seems for me to be too much). I used for a feeding all tank (no target feeding) the second water after thawing half of cube of mysis and marine cousine. First thawed water was discarded, then added some saltwater and use this for a feeding. 2-3 times daily. And a lot of dried Cyclop-eeze. Tried at beginning Kent's Micro-Vert, Chroma-Plex and Zoo-Plex - was not impressed, as if I added nothing at all.
The first tank was 5-6g hexagon, housing these cucumbers and the big Christmas three rock, which requires the similar feeding in a large quantities.
Because golden SS cucumber was mistaken for FF one, I had no place for it in my bare-bottom tanks, and in shallow sand bed were not enough food for it. Started add the slow sinking pellets for a bottom feeders - much better, 1-2 pellets daily.
Then united 2 tanks into 20g long tank with enough sand for SS cuke.
Feeding in this tank was drastically reduced, because mandarin and scooter received a lot of frozen and pellet food, more than enough particles in the water column - even for 2 babies Tridacna maxima. For a few weeks added ESV spray-dried phytoplankton, but the recommended dose was too much, not eaten and polluted water of this skimmerless tank.
I have them no more: bought colorful nudibranches Chromodoris magnifica and Chromodoris quadricolor, then all sponges I could find for their feeding. The blue one died, then next day one of the nudibranches, then tank crashed (details are
here), a lot of inhabitants died, cucumbers too, RIP.
Total time frame - beginning of August to the end of November. FF Christmas tree rock was acquired earlier and is well even now.
What was good - neither of them eviscerated, so they are safe.
Note on tanks for filter feeders: hexagon was very good, cube should be too - flow goes round, top to bottom.
Seems, it's all.
I didn't have wrasse there, chromises, mandarin and scooter only. No problem with these.
Here are links to Robert Toonen's articles about sea cucumbers:
Sea cucumbers - Part I: The Medusa Worms
Sea Cucumbers - Part II: Sand-stirrers.
Sea Cucumbers - Part III: Sea Apples.
