Zoanthid garden and palytoxin
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I cant comment on the second question (toxicity), except that its really not a bug deal if you handle them carefully.
One the first question, its simple you take a big piece of rock keep it in lower part of the tank and glue different fargs of zoas at different sides and let them grow. You can spot feed them. Be aware of different growth rate of the zoas, the fast growers will cover most space
heres a photo of my zoa garden in 29G
and this is a pico tank housing a single rock, thats mostly populated by zoas
One the first question, its simple you take a big piece of rock keep it in lower part of the tank and glue different fargs of zoas at different sides and let them grow. You can spot feed them. Be aware of different growth rate of the zoas, the fast growers will cover most space
heres a photo of my zoa garden in 29G
and this is a pico tank housing a single rock, thats mostly populated by zoas
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There's really no concern with palytoxin as long as you don't boil the rock with live zoas/palys on the rock or sniff them after fragging.
And if you really paranoid you can always do it outside .
And if you really paranoid you can always do it outside .
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biophilia
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In general, stay away from species like Palythoa heliodiscus, Palythoa cf. toxica, and possibly Palythoa grandis. Beyond that, there's not a ton of research into how much palytoxin is present in most of the zoas and palys available in the hobby. There's probably little if any in most of the fancy zoas out there. But like James and Ranjib said, it's not a big worry as long as you're not doing something stupid like fragging them with a razor blade in your open palm while drinking scotch or trying to boil them in a pot on your stove.
@biophilia Healdsburg and Bozeman are two of my pico reef tanks named after two American small towns, that I like a lot. They are tshow tankank in Bay Area makerfaire. I show them off with my DIY controllers. Since it attracts lots of different folks outside our hobby as well, I also maintain a summary of the tank here: https://reef-pi.github.io/additional-documentation/healdsburg/
No, you can add zoas over time. Keep in mind that some are faster growers than others so one zoa might out compete the other. Zoa gardens are really neat looking, we grew a rasta and hornet garden.
No.
Most zoas wont kill each other. How old is you tank? Glue the slow growing zoas first, if you have a stable tank. If you are new, go with easy to keep zoas
No one really knows, there has not been test on most zoanthids or protopalythoa for toxicity levels..
Just take precautions: Wear eye protection, wear gloves, make sure you have no cuts, Make sure the water they are held in is discarded properly and quickly.. Handle it like other poisons you may have in your house..
I know someone who lost their dog because the dog drank out of a bucket the zoes were in.
I got minor poisoning because I broke a piece of bubble algae in the middle of zoas and it squirted me in the eye.
Personally I would not keep zoas if you have kids around.
As far as a garden place zoas close to each other, provide proper flow and lighting and you should be ok.
Most zoas are ok next to each other and most require pretty much close to the same care.
Just not enough research yet. I would follow the advice of biophilia and avoid those that are known to be quite toxic and avoid personal contact as there are lots of stories of injury out there., some with serious injury. My experience is that if you avoid most Paly's and just go with Zoa's you shouldn't have much trouble. In the long term some will win out and become dominant just like in nature.
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