Tank mystery still unsolved....

[floridaboy704]

Well today I can find no trace of my yellow polyps. Completely gone!:wow2:
I watch this tank day and night and I have yet to see anything at all bother them. I have seen a few of the larger pods around them, but thats it... One day they are out and healthy, a week later they are gone. Does anyone have the number to CSI?? Im thinking I have some hitchhiker that is yet to be discovered. Water params are perfect. The mushrooms, rics, and zoa in the area are doing fine... has anyone had them just up and disappear before??

I also woke up this morning to find the kenya tree that was close to the xenia detached from its rock and laying on the bottom ... I didnt think xenia had chemical warfare or stinging warfare tactics. if i just relocate him to another area... will he comeback from the neighborly war that went on??

I dont know whats going on with my tank... everything else is thriving except these 2 things.....

Oh and besides the fact that a turbo snail kicked the bucket for some unknown reason... he was the largest and probably died of old age. He even had tiny tubeworms growing on his shell. I guess this is the life of a reefer...

HELP!!!

 

[floridaboy704]

BeesBaby;169974 wrote: Wow....this is a mystery.....

Must be an invisible tank with invisible inhabitants hitting the backspace or delete key to not allow a posting to be made about their habitat.

Wow what is that about??? You know what... im not in the mood for this... forget I even made the post.... its things like this that drive people away from forums... I will figure it out on my own or the whole freakin thing can die. I was just wondering if things like these disappearances were common or what.

 

[skriz]

in time you will learn that NOTHING will kill a kenya tree....NOTHING! They detatch from time to time and will also drop "babies"

 

[floridaboy704]

Sorry about that, Im a bit on edge with this today. Im just new and dont know what to expect or what to do when things like this happen. Its a little frustrating. Not to mention just before I made this post I found one of my 2 cats had been killed by something last night, and just got done burying him. Again Im sorry about the "tude" i had, its not like me, thanks for the suggestion BeesBaby, I didnt see them detach or see them anywhere in the tank they may have relocated to. As a matter of fact, the 2 largest heads were just there yesterday morning, but had shrunk up last night which is normal. When I checked the tank after dealing with my cat, they were gone as was the kenya tree. Again my appologies but today hasnt been a good one.

 

[floridaboy704]

Skriz;169984 wrote: in time you will learn that NOTHING will kill a kenya tree....NOTHING! They detatch from time to time and will also drop "babies"

Thanks for that, I will try moving it to my fuge and see if it recouperates. Its only a frag, I would say maybe 3 inches tall about 4 days ago. I noticed it dropped a tiny arm, but do frags "frag" themselves being so small??

 

[floridaboy704]

dawgdude;169988 wrote: Floridaboy, there have been some site issues recently. I made a post in response to something recently and when I went back the post I responded to was gone. Something crazy happened with the site and it temporarily merged two threads and then poof it was all gone! VERY weird. Bees is one of the nicest users and she meant no harm.

I know, again I appologise. When I wrote that I was still teary from my cat... I should think twice before replying.

dawgdude;169988 wrote: Ok as far as the yellow polyps, Do you have a peppermint shrimp or copper banded? Also it is possible you could have a medusa worm that hitch hiked in. They are a huge black worm that will eat corals at night and then disappear into the rocks. Let me know what livestock you have. It also could be a crab, they can eat polyps from time to time.

No peps yet or CBS. I was actually planning to get some peps for my flatworm prob and to add some variety. I was worried about the peps eating zoa or my mushrooms actually so im glad you said this, I will scratch them off the list and go with a skunk or fire shrimp instead. Too bad I love peps.

I consider myself a night watcher lol and have yet to see any kind of worm except for the occasional bristle worm (not fireworm). I used to have an emerald crab that decapitated one of the yellow polyps when I first got them. After he did this, he went back to the LFS the next day. That was over a month ago and havent seen anything around them since. Here is what I have in the tank so far...

hammer coral frag
2 pom pom xenia clusters
sm zoa cluster
kenya tree frag (if it lives)
GSP
1 mushroom and 2 rics

8 blue leg hermits
1 astrea snail
1 cerinth snail
1 turbo snail

1 false perc named Tank

I have many stromatella (i think thats how you spell it) that are actually spawning, asternia stars ( i know they arent bothering it, they just graze algae, i love watching them graze on the sides and seeing their stomachs come out). Maybe there is some elusive hitchhiker somewhere I havent found.

 

[floridaboy704]

Wait a minute... There is something I havent identified yet in there. At night on two seperate pieces of LR I see something stringy come out. It kind of elongates then retracts. It kind of looks like a chameleon tongue for lack of better example, only wayyyy smaller. It waves around in the current but isnt anywhere close to the two corals mentioned. I sometimes see it during the day when i feed the clown. I assumed it was harmless as it doesnt actually move from its spot other than expanding to feed i guess. I havent ruled out the Idea of having some hitch hiker crab somewhere because when I started the tank I used about 4 lbs of cured base rock. I havent seen it but that doesnt mean it isnt there. I will google medusa worm and see what comes up.

 

[platyplakia]

What are your water perameters. I've had yellow polyps die off before when my amonia and nitrates were too high. That's the first thing I would check. Did you ever see any of them shrivelling up? Or any other signs of stress?

 

[raisingtwo2006]

I'm sure that your Kenya will be fine, as was said earlier, NOTHING will kill them!! I made a trip from Macon to Columbus when we moved, and all my corals stayed in a cooler overnight- due to delay in unpacking and setting up the tank, I lost pretty much EVERY coral I had in there, even the xenia, EXCEPT for the Kenyas.

And yes, they will frag off the tiniest little pieces and that's fine. I would say he would be fine to put back in the tank. I had a HUGE piece that I got from Dakota last year that would shrink up and flop over, next morning, it would be all spry again, and there would be 40 new frags attatched everywhere!!

And if for some reason you did get the one piece of kenya that doesn't have a heart of stone, I will be more than willing to bring you about 12 frags next week when I pass through ATL on my way to SC.

 

[floridaboy704]

Platyplakia;170001 wrote: What are your water perameters. I've had yellow polyps die off before when my amonia and nitrates were too high. That's the first thing I would check. Did you ever see any of them shrivelling up? Or any other signs of stress?

I just did a water check last night... here it is

ammonia- 0
Nitrite- 0
Nitrate- undetectable
pH- 8.0
salinity- 1.025-1.026 kind of in between

For about the last week I have noticed them shrivel up at night, thats about it. about 2 weeks ago the didnt open up for 2 days then came right back out in full glory. Im just lost with them... I dont see how the could all disappear in a 5 hour time span <u>unless</u></em> something did eat them when I was sleeping. But like I said, whatever it is left alone the rics, mushroom, and zoa because the yellow polyps were smack in the middle (not touching) :huh:

 

[raisingtwo2006]

Are the yellow polyps you are referring to the Yellow Star Polyps? If you'd like, when I come through ATL on the 4th, I can bring you a shell covered in them..

That shell was from Jefft last year, and started with like 4 polyps, but has since populated my tank in three different huge places. I'd love to pass on the love if you want it..LMK.

 

[floridaboy704]

From a friend of mine at the LFS who was re-scaping and adding different pieces of LR to his reef. This LR had been in his tank over 4 years.

 

[floridaboy704]

Just an update but I just did my weekly water change and the polyps are nowhere to be found. I can promise you this, my eyes will be peeled for the culprit. I took my emerald crab back for decapitating one, I hate to see what will happen to the killer of many lol.

I put the kenya on an in tank frag rack, hopefully it will make a good recovery. Thanks for all the suggestions and help! It is really appreciated.

 

[tim8111]

Chances are your emerald crab ate the yellow polyps. Emerald crabs love the taste of yellow polyps. I know this one from first hand knowledge. Just my thoughts.

Tim

 

[drnecropolis]

I thought he took the emerald back?

 

[tim8111]

DrNecropolis;170123 wrote: I thought he took the emerald back?

Hmm missed that in the first reading.