2 Q's...pink Sea Cucumber And Plumping Up My Torch And Frogspawn C

[craigybaby37]

ok so question number 1......ive got myself a pink sea cucumber as i was told by my LFS they are good sand cleaners is this right??? as all it seems to do is stay in the corner of the tank right at the top and just move about the glass however i did see it go down on the rocks when the lights went out so are they nocturnal creatures???

And question number 2...... i have a torch coral and frogspawn coral in my tank and both are just not as plump as they were when i first got them.
They both look healthy and open when its light ans shrink when its dark but they just dont seem to get plump. water params are fine and my ph is 8.2 and calcium is 440ppm.
I have got 2 x 150watt halides and 48 watts of t5 lights

does anyone have any tips on prehaps getting them to plump up a bit.......would moving them in the tank help maybe??

 

[xxBarneyxx]

Cant help on the first question im afraid as I know nothing about them.

For the torch and hammer the lighting sounds fine (mine are doing great in around 200w of T5). What kind of flow do you have them in? I have found that they dont like direct flow but dont like completely still water either. "gently swaying" is probably the best way I can describe the flow that Ihave found best.

 

[rabbut]

Do you test Magnesium and Alkalinity? Being hard corals, Calsium is not the only level you need to be testing with them

Sea cucumbers I believe are green algea eaters They will patrol rocks and glass eating any un-disireable algea. They get moderatly large, to 8" I believe, and have the dissadvantage of nuking tanks quite often when they die, releasing a deadly toxin when they do (Disclaimer, I may be thinking of something else here, so await confirmation )

All the best
Rabbut

 

[SkiFletch]

The term "Sea Cucumber" means very little, there are hundreds of species falling into that general moniker. Any chance of a pic of it craig? As for the euphyllia, will need to know mag and alk as mentioned, also have you double checked your salinity monitoring device lately? Possible your drifting up and they're not quite happy. Is the flesh receeding from the base of the stalk towards teh mouth at all?

 

[craigybaby37]

i hope you are thnkin of something else when saying about the sea cucumber nuking a tank as that doesnt sound good at all lol

Not testing for magnesium so ill order a test kit from ebay in a min......and when you say alkelinity what do you meen i cant remember what it is sorry.

will test me refractometer in a min will RO water be fine???

no skin as comming off the corals its just they have lost there plumpness that ime worryed about

will get some pics up shortly i just charging my camera battery

 

[rabbut]

RO will give an idea of if the salinity is right, but it may not be 100% accurate. The best way to check calibration is to test some water of known salinity, in the range you would expect in a marine tank, and then adjust your meter/reading as appropriate

Alkalinity is sometimes abreviated to KH. Alkalinity is a measure of carbonate salts, hence the term KH or Carbonate Hardness when refuring to it

All the best
Rabbut

 

[craigybaby37]

ime with ya now on the carbonate hardenss i have a test kit but to be honest i havnt tested in a while ill get one the case now though.

ill take my refractometer to my LFS over the weekend and calibrate it with there water then.

here is a few pics just so ya know what ime talking about. The frogspawn is as big as it gets as you see it in the picture and i have seen it alot bigger before when it had 4 heads whereas now its got 8.

just as update the sea cucumber is now on the sand having a good dig around.

just tested KH and it come out about 100mg/l which according to the booklet is a little low it says between 1.5 and 125mg/l is about right???

 

[seffieuk]

I had a similar problem when i got my hammer and frogspawn, I moved them closer to the light ( ihave t5s) and as Barney said made sure there was flow over them but not enough that they were struggling against it - they 'plumped up' within hours and now my hammer is one of my favourite corals

That cucumber is there is something very creepy about them sorry, as Barney says they are well known for nuking a tank when they die. I'm sure Ski will identify which sort it is and how risky it is, but boy they are ugly!

Seffie x

 

[rabbut]

Not what I was thinking about, but it isn't something I know about...

All the best
Rabbut

 

[craigybaby37]

i find it fascinating lol but ill defo agree its one ugly lookin creature without a doubt but very interesting to watch it at work eating the sand

ive changed the flow around in the tank aswell now so ill see how i get on with it. ive got just under 30x flow in the tank which is ideal ( so i believe anyway) this is done by a hydor koralia 3 and 4 but trouble is ime struggling to find a good position to point them to give a variation of flow to the tank. Might try moving on of the power heads to the oposite side of the tank as atm they are both on one side pointing in different directions.

 

[craigybaby37]

Been havin a read on the internet about the link between calcium and alkalinity but ime getting confused about some stuff.

Whats the best stuff to use to raise my alkalinity??? been reading that baking soda does the trick???

 

[rabbut]

It will, yes

 

[xxBarneyxx]

With regards to your powerheads I would recommend having them on oppisite sides as well. This can create much more random flow patterns in the tank and helps to stop and low flow/deadspots forming.

 

[craigybaby37]

what about dosages for the baking soda??? how much do i add per litre to raise by X ammount???

 

[craigybaby37]

ive got some baking powder from my mum which she says is the same as baking soda ( ime thinking it just a different way its said by americanc and english) ime sure someone will tell me if they are the same or not.

Anywho here are the ingrediants i just fort ide check to make sure i was using the right stuff.

Rice flour, raising agents: disodium diphosphate and sodium hydrogen carbonate???

last thing i wanna do is add something i shouldnt and what about dosages???