Thanks everyone! We'll I wasn't expecting to pickup anything new for a while after the Blueberry Gorgonian but I went to Portland today and saw 2 things at Cuttlefish & Corals (great store, check it out if you're ever in Portland) that i just couldn't pass up. Pictures coming later
Some updated shots of the Tube Anemone, surprisingly it's got a lot of tentacle extension and really likes the high flow.So the 2 things I snagged today included; Yellow Banded Possum Wrasse & A Orange Tentacle Tube Anemone!
I'll go more in depth about the Possum Wrasse once I get a good picture, he was showing stress coloration and overall was pretty freaked out with the 3 hour drive so I released him and now letting him settle in. Didn't want to freak hom out too much in the photography container.
Which leads me to the next addition, a Tube Anemone! It's kind of funny since I was talking to my friend from the Aquarium of the Pacific and he mentioned I should add one but I said I haven't seen one for sale in a while. What a coincidence lol
This one is just a standard Orange Tentacle w/ Green Center, which is still very striking. I don't have an orange filter for my camera yet unfortunately so I took a shot of it under blues with my phone and it's striking.
Despite common myth, Tube Anemone stings are actually really weak. To my knowledge, they're planktivores / fulter feeders and only affect fish if they're really weak & dying, so I have no worries about this one.
The Tube is about 2" and the tentacles are around 4". I'm interested to see how it'll do in a high flow area since a lot of times when I've seen them, they're in pretty low flow (such as the Monterey Bay Aquarium) so I might have to experiment with placement. So far it seems happy, but I'll keep an eye on it for the next few weeks.
Also some new shots of the Blueberry, getting more extension every day!
I swear everytime I look at it, I notice more polyps I didn't see before
Levi Peterson mentioned that his A. Isoxya also sheds a lot which is really interesting and something to note. I haven't really seen any of the other Gorgs shed since I've had them but so far this is the second shed of the Isoxya so that's interesting why it's just a species thing. So it seems like both pieces are just going to go through their shed cycle and hopefully soon it'll open back up
Those blueberry pictures are incredible looking!Well the A. Isoxya is shedding again, both pieces. I'm a little concerned since I'm not sure if it's supposed to be shedding this much (I might've stressed it a bit yesterday, I think I topped off the tank too fast) but everything else is happy so it might just be an individual thing. I'm really excited since usually after a shed, the coral tends to be extremely fluffy and fully extended so can't wait for that.
In the mean time, more Blueberry pics and a Menella pic, there was a problem with the Red Sea Whip I'll talk a bit about soon since I want to showcase the bad as well but thankfully it's making a comeback.
Thank you so much! Unfortunately I don't but that'll be top priority once everything is happy again. I did recently upgrade to the Sony a7iv and the photos coming out are
so they should be pretty sweet
speaking of photos, a new addition coming next week I just picked up should make this tank a whole lot more sweet. Or "festive" I guess you could sayThank you so much! Unfortunately I don't but that'll be top priority once everything is happy again. I did recently upgrade to the Sony a7iv and the photos coming out are
I finally found one after a super long time and while i've kept the other species that are available, this is like the holy grail, and it has some other inhabitants on there I was really looking for. The sale at Corals.com really helped since for the quality and quantity of the piece, this is the best price I've ever seen one for and I don't think I'll come across it again so I knew I had to finally take the chance. Hopefully they come in alright, it's supposed to be rainy here next week thank goodness so the heat shouldn't be an issue. Now to get the tank clean for the new comers!
Sorry about the smoke entering your house!Unfortunately I wasn't very observant today and accidentally left my window open before I left, and while the fires have subsided in the Eastern part of the state, the air quality and smoke is still lingering and a bunch of ash particles came through my window and landed in the tank since I don't have a lid (changing very soon after this) which caused some of the parameters to go wack. I immediately did a 50% WC after I noticed all the ash on the surface. Combined with the heatwave we got in the past week, some of the corals got it worse than others. Specifically the big colony of Menella and the Red Sea Whip have notable tissue loss though they should bounce back. It also looks like I may've lost the Swalesi and possibly the Yellow Banded Possum unfortunately. The Swalesi stopped eating a little while ago and the heat wave might've been the final straw. I haven't seen the Possum recently though I'm hoping it's just hiding and it didn't pass away. Fingers crossed
Another thing I didn't even notice was somehow my fridge that I keep all the food in got unplugged so all of it spoiled due to the heat which isn't the biggest deal as I needed to restock anyways and will do that tomorrow, I thought it was just good to mention to make sure to double check your equipment and that everything is working.
Something interesting and kind of cool is that my Tube Anemone actually abandoned it's tube. At first I thought it was dead since I've never heard of this happening but a quick search here on R2R mentions that they do this either when they've gotten too big for their current tube or if conditions in the spot they were in are now unfavorable. Based off recent events, I want to go with the latter, but other than that, it's still doing well. I never knew how long they were! It really gives a sense of scale on how deep they borrow in the sand.
Other than that, the other corals are doing well minus some minimal tissue loss. Hopefully the rain this week clears up the rest of the smoke since I'd really hate for this to happen again when the new inhabitants arrive. And the photos coming out of the A7iv are really awesome, it's the first time I've been able to photograph my own corals since everything has been stressed by the heat.
Thanks everyone, I think I'm at least glad this happened before the new inhabitants come since I think with how much ash was on the surface, a good amount of them wouldn't have survived so good thing I got everything sorted out before
Christmas tree worms are my dream!!!They're here!
Christmas in August? That's right! Meet the Christmas Tree Worms!
These have been a holy grail of mine for so many years ever since I saw them in a BBC Documentary narrated by David Attenborough when I was in Elementary school. While I've kept the other species that's available in the hobby (smaller and less color variety), these Australian ones specifically have been on my bucketlist.
After seeing them pop up periodically, I finally grabbed from @coralsdotcom and couldn't be happier. My main motivator were the Yellow Pagurita Hermits that live alongside the worms on the Porities, but turns out there's actually other species of fan worm and barnacles on here too, totalling the amount of species that live on this small piece of Coral to about 5 which is insane.
I'm still getting used to photographing them, it's hard since you can't really get everything in focus and they are quite small, though I'm experimenting with it.
I've counted about 8 or 9 Main Worms and 3 Crabs (in the photo on the site, I only saw 7 Worms and 2 crabs so this was awesome to discover). There are many different colors but my favorite has to be either the Red, Gold, & White worm or the Bright Orange since that's a classic.
There's also interestingly enough at least 1 or 2 other species of fan worm on here, and a barnacle. I never knew Barnacles came on Porities but that just adds to the cool biodiversity.
So far so good with them in terms of I've seen what I believe are all the worms out at least once. Some are more reclusive than others which is interesting but the ones that stay hidden most of the time are the smaller ones such as the Blue and another Orange so I guess it makes sense.
