Ron Reefman's Rock Flower experience

tankstudy · Sep 17, 2018

salty joe said:
Do these spiders attack other types of anemones?

From what I have seen, they go after anything that is all soft tissue. They also attacked my BTA.

Ron Reefman · Sep 17, 2018

Saltyhog, that's a nice collection of RFA's! And thanks for the videos, those are awesome. Since you've had the spawning events, have you ever seen any babies?

Salty Joe... 'spiders"...??? What spiders?

I've never seen my RFA's attack anything but food. But that's just my personal experience. I do have mini-maxi anemones in the tank and they seem just fine right next to the RFA's. My RBTA's are very small and they have never been to close to an adult RFA. But I have both a RFA and a RBTA in a small container while trying to get them to settle into pvc end caps or onto rocks. So far they have been fine together, but they are both quite small. And some of the baby RFA's that were turned loose in the tank settled into zoa colonies and the zoas and RFA's both appear to be doing fine after 6 months. The RFA's are getting a bit bigger and will eventually stretch up and out over the zoas which will probably cut off enough light that I'll lose a few. But its' a small colony with 100 polyps, not a frag plug with just a few. If it were a small number of polyps, I'd separate them.

salty joe · Sep 17, 2018

I will be getting a CUC from Reeftopia soon and thought I might try a flower anemone too. I assume I should QT the anemone. Is there a treatment for spiders? How big are they?

saltyhog · Sep 17, 2018

Ron Reefman said:
Saltyhog, that's a nice collection of RFA's! And thanks for the videos, those are awesome. Since you've had the spawning events, have you ever seen any babies?

I have not seen any babies which is why I think I might be incredibly unlucky to have all 5 of my RFA's to be males.

How do they time spawning? Everytime they all seem to spawn simultaneously except the small one.

Ron Reefman · Sep 17, 2018

That would be pretty incredible bad luck to have 5 and have them all be female! As you said, a 1 in 32 chance! But if you aren't seeing babies, I'd be willing to bet you are right.

I've never happened to catch mine spawning so I don't know that there is a particular time of the year, or lunar cycle. Heck, I don't even know if there may be a particular time of day they prefer to spawn. What time of day did you catch yours spawning? I have heard that they tend to 'puff up' or stretch out their trunk and cup their face when they spawn. And your video seems to confirm that. Thanks.

saltyhog · Sep 17, 2018

Ron Reefman said:
That would be pretty incredible bad luck to have 5 and have them all be female! As you said, a 1 in 32 chance! But if you aren't seeing babies, I'd be willing to bet you are right.

I've never happened to catch mine spawning so I don't know that there is a particular time of the year, or lunar cycle. Heck, I don't even know if there may be a particular time of day they prefer to spawn. What time of day did you catch yours spawning? I have heard that they tend to 'puff up' or stretch out their trunk and cup their face when they spawn. And your video seems to confirm that. Thanks.

Yeah, I'm afraid I am...all 5 males. Seems like I would have seen a few babies with the number of times they've spawned in the last couple of years if there were any females.

They almost always cup and extend when they spawn. Occasionally one or two won't but the 3 largest ones always do. I'll have to start documenting the timing and see if it's lunar or not. The almost always start as the lights are ramping down and seem to peak right after lights out.

Ron Reefman · Sep 18, 2018

saltyhog said:
Yeah, I'm afraid I am...all 5 males. Seems like I would have seen a few babies with the number of times they've spawned in the last couple of years if there were any females.

They almost always cup and extend when they spawn. Occasionally one or two won't but the 3 largest ones always do. I'll have to start documenting the timing and see if it's lunar or not. The almost always start as the lights are ramping down and seem to peak right after lights out.

saltyhog, the part I highlighted in blue is super useful information for those of us who know our RFA's have spawned (because we have had babies) but haven't seen it happen yet. Thanks so much for offering up any advise you have.

If I knew which one of my adults was female I'd offer you a trade! So how is it that you have seen the spawn happen so often? Do you spend a lot of time watching the tank at that time of night!

My tank is in the dining room (we NEVER eat in there) which is open to our living room (where we have 2 big wooden executive desks and lap top computers (1 for me and 1 for my wife) and open to the kitchen. My lights ramp down over 6 hours, from 5pm till 11pm. And our only TV is in the bedroom, so late night the only time I see the tank is when I go into the kitchen for a late night snack. Now I'll admit, when the house is dark and it's dark outside (the tank is near the doorwall out to the lanai) and the blue leds are on, the tank looks amazing. I picked corals (and RFA's) for their ability to fluoresce bright colors. And I do walk over to the tank almost every time I go into the kitchen at night as the bright colors glowing in the dark room just draw me in. It's like looking at a small patch of Pandora at night (think the movie Avatar when Keanu Reeves is running around the rain forest at night).

saltyhog · Sep 18, 2018

My tank has always been in the room where I spend the most time. It's now in my new home's "mancave". My lighting schedule is set up to coincide with the time I'm most often home. The lights are ramping down as I leave to go to bed and that's when I most commonly see spawning.

The cupping and extending is usually just before the start of semen production but the whole thing usually lasts a few hours. First time it happened I thought they were dying until the actual spawning started.

During the biggest events (especially the one where my snails joined in) the tank looked like diluted milk.

saltyhog · Sep 18, 2018

I looked through my videos and found 3 videos. The moon phase was new crescent or waning crescent in all 3. May be coincidental but I'll see what's up the next time they spawn.

Ron Reefman · Sep 19, 2018

saltyhog said:
I looked through my videos and found 3 videos. The moon phase was new crescent or waning crescent in all 3. May be coincidental but I'll see what's up the next time they spawn.

Again, great info, even if it is just coincidence. I really appreciate your going back and checking it out. It's at least something to investigate and either prove or disprove.

If you lived nearby I'd offer to trade you a RFA or two in hopes that you get a female!

Katrina71 · Sep 19, 2018

Great you guys...I'm now watching RFA po.. with my coffee. Sick. Just sick

Ron Reefman · Sep 19, 2018

Katrina71 said:
Great you guys...I'm now watching RFA po.. with my coffee. Sick. Just sick.

You can call it that if you want, after all it is a video. But you'd love to see that happening in your tank! Just like finding snail eggs on the glass or clownfish eggs on a rock. As Jeff Goldblum said in Jurassic Park,"Life finds a way!" ;Smuggrin

Katrina71 · Sep 19, 2018

Ron Reefman said:
You can call it that if you want, after all it is a video. But you'd love to see that happening in your tank! Just like finding snail eggs on the glass or clownfish eggs on a rock. As Jeff Goldblum said in Jurassic Park,"Life finds a way!" ;Smuggrin

I think RFAs are so interesting. I'm trying to learn as much as I can. Is there a way to sex them before spawning habits are observed?

Ron Reefman · Sep 19, 2018

Katrina71 said:
I think RFAs are so interesting. I'm trying to learn as much as I can. Is there a way to sex them before spawning habits are observed?

Not that I am aware of. One poster said that females are bigger than males. But there is no research that either of us can find to back that up. The other thing that we seem to be finding is that the male will rise up a little off the sand or rock and extend it's trunk and cup it's oral disk upward at the outer edges. I've never seen mine spawn, but several videos I've seen show this behaviour. But you won't have to think about that for a year or two until it gets big enough.

BTW, I would recommend spot feeding yours about once every week or two. Any meaty food like mysis shrimp. I thaw a cube in some tank water, turn off all the pumps (wavemakers and return) and use a turkey baster to suck up some food and deliver it right to the anemones tentacles. Sometimes I have to actually touch or push around the tentacles a little bit to get the anemone to know there is food at hand! But they do have zooxanthellae as well, so they do get fed photosynthetically as well. But because they come from deeper water (30' to 50') they don't get nearly as much light and the zooxanthellae doesn't do enough photosynthesis to allow the RFA to survive without being fed.

Katrina71 · Sep 19, 2018

Ron Reefman said:
Not that I am aware of. One poster said that females are bigger than males. But there is no research that either of us can find to back that up. The other thing that we seem to be finding is that the male will rise up a little off the sand or rock and extend it's trunk and cup it's oral disk upward at the outer edges. I've never seen mine spawn, but several videos I've seen show this behaviour. But you won't have to think about that for a year or two until it gets big enough.

BTW, I would recommend spot feeding yours about once every week or two. Any meaty food like mysis shrimp. I thaw a cube in some tank water, turn off all the pumps (wavemakers and return) and use a turkey baster to suck up some food and deliver it right to the anemones tentacles. Sometimes I have to actually touch or push around the tentacles a little bit to get the anemone to know there is food at hand! But they do have zooxanthellae as well, so they do get fed photosynthetically as well. But because they come from deeper water (30' to 50') they don't get nearly as much light and the zooxanthellae doesn't do enough photosynthesis to allow the RFA to survive without being fed.

Pretty sure we have a male.

Katrina71 · Sep 19, 2018

Ron Reefman said:
Not that I am aware of. One poster said that females are bigger than males. But there is no research that either of us can find to back that up. The other thing that we seem to be finding is that the male will rise up a little off the sand or rock and extend it's trunk and cup it's oral disk upward at the outer edges. I've never seen mine spawn, but several videos I've seen show this behaviour. But you won't have to think about that for a year or two until it gets big enough.

BTW, I would recommend spot feeding yours about once every week or two. Any meaty food like mysis shrimp. I thaw a cube in some tank water, turn off all the pumps (wavemakers and return) and use a turkey baster to suck up some food and deliver it right to the anemones tentacles. Sometimes I have to actually touch or push around the tentacles a little bit to get the anemone to know there is food at hand! But they do have zooxanthellae as well, so they do get fed photosynthetically as well. But because they come from deeper water (30' to 50') they don't get nearly as much light and the zooxanthellae doesn't do enough photosynthesis to allow the RFA to survive without being fed.

No worries we target feed. Goes crazy for nutrimar ova.