Tina's Twin Bommies

[1entra]

I'm loving the mandarin Tina, it really is a beautiful fish and I have been eyeing one up for several months now at the lfs but still not sure if to buy it or not as supposed to be hard to look after and keep fed... does yours eat frozen food? and how hard you finding it to keep? i really am seriously considering getting one now after having looked through your journal. I have got a scooter blenny in my tank in my room that i have had for over a year now and they are supposed toi be hard to feed etc but mine eats frozen food out of my hand. it knows exactly what times feeding times are as soon as food goes into the tank it heads straight for it's set feeding spot where i reach onto the tank with some frozen mysis or brineshrimp and feed it directly out of my hand. lovely little fish i must admit!!!

oh and overall your tank is looking really healthy and coming on really well

 

[SkiFletch]

Point of interest, they are tentacles, not polyps. Technically with Euphyllia, the mouths dictate which parts of the coral are the individual polyps, the tentacles are just tentacles

Yes yes, I know, I'm bieng picky

 

[johnnyjtaylor]

Yes yes, I know, I'm bieng picky

But correct and that can only be a good thing

 

[TigerIssey]

Point of interest, they are tentacles, not polyps. Technically with Euphyllia, the mouths dictate which parts of the coral are the individual polyps, the tentacles are just tentacles

Yes yes, I know, I'm bieng picky

Reet thats fine. I will now talk about balls on the ends of tentacles. Somehow that sounds even worse.



Johnny, He does eat frozen, however, he much prefers the pods. When frozen is fed to the tank, he does come out and pick at it then give a wonderful display of finnage to the front glass.

I will have had him a week on Monday so I am not counting my chickens till they have hatched.

I would say, make sure the one you buy is fat. If the belly area is sunken at all, walk away, it will lead to heartbreak.

Take a look at the Mandarin Diner on Melelvs Reef, I am intending to train him to use one. Need to get a better sized jar though, everything gets in the one I have. Try using New Era Omnivore Pellets too, they can be moulded like putty to form a larger ball that can be stuck onto the rockwork. He may eat it, he may not.

I am seriously on the search for a nice female now. Caesar would appreciate that I think.

 

[TigerIssey]

A few pics for you.

What is interesting is that I usually do a water change of 10% once a week. This week that is over due by 2 days due to the fact I have had surgery on my right arm.

It seems to have not bothered the corals at all, in fact they look really good. They are due for a feed today so some are not as enhanced as usual but by and large, the display looks better.

All I have done today is to give the sand a poke with a chopstick, scrape the glass and change the carbon and phosphate remover as this was due.

In the last week my xenia has doubled in size as has my frogspawn and the hammer looks stunning, cannot now see the branches when the tentacles are expanded.

The sea hare has cleared the bryopsis from the right and just has the left to do now. I am hoping its growth will be halted a little by new phosphate remover.

Time for pics.

The startfish, see how the polyps it is not touching are still expanded. There is some detritus between the polyps on this one, thats why the star is there.

I believe there may be some coral warfare going on here, what do you think ?

The Left Bommie

The Right Bommie

^^^Can you see how well the frogspawn is doing now.


The Full Tank Shot - This is the view I see most of the day from the computer

Hope you can help with the ??coral Warfare.

 

[youngfisher]

Your tank looks stunning!!!!

YF

 

[bagu]

left bommie gets my vote ;D even though there is no competition

stunning tank!

 

[gazzab06]

That is one gorgeous tank. You should be very proud

gaz

 

[rabbut]

Well, Bubbles have strong stings, so if it had attacked that plate, there would be blatently obvious damage and the thing would not expend correctly in the stung area. Bubbles are easily damages also, so a sting attack from a more agressive coral would leave a lot of damaged polyps that again should be obvious. I personally don't think anything is going on between the two, but watch them to be sure after lights off

All the best
Rabbut

 

[1entra]

Iv had coral warfare go off in my tank before and rather than chance major damange I would personally shift the corals apart a little bit, savesany uncertaintys. Or you could monitor the 2 corals for a da or 2 to see if there are any changes cause could be the coral nit opening just coz it dont feel like it, Id keep an eye out at night for stinging tentacles and then move them if I see any that see in reach!

 

[TigerIssey]

The strange thing was that the Trachy had an oval protrusion from its normal shape at the same time as the polyps only on that side of the coral closed.

This has happened a few times in the last 24 hrs. Will keep an eye it.

 

[ben1987]

pics are looking good tina!

 

[garry_boyd3]

HI Tina, Good pictures as always.

Thanks for the idea of the hairy mushroom. Was deivered yesterday bright luminous green about an inch in size. Its looking great.

 

[SkiFletch]

Might be more of warning shots fired i this case. You'd be surprised how intricate coral contact can be. Miight be just some kind of chemical alleopathic pre-cursor that the brain is responding to. The bubble is like hey, this is my spot, get out of here, and the brain is just being meek in response... Definitely not outright combat with nematocysts though, that's very obvious as rabbut said. My tank is becoming an exercise in nematocyst behavior

 

[TigerIssey]

Thanks everyone.

Thanks Ski. I will keep an eye on that. That bubble seems to have got very big very quickly (probably the amount of food I giving it along with the KZ LPS amino acid). I am intending to move the bubble slightly to the left but not too close to the Galaxea (else that could be even worse). Good job I am getting a bigger tank again, something stops me from even thinking about fragging that bubble, will look stunning large in a 6ft tank.

My first Xenia walking event happened today, one branch is now completely on another rock to where it started. They seem to be liking the new powerheads much more than the lateral flow ones. It did not like the seio in the first day or so but once the direction was tweeked, it has really started to multiply. The Rhodactis are now huge, a week or so after the stitches come out of my arm, I am going to have to start fragging I think. Wanted to do myzoas before the surgery but just did not get chance.

I managed to pick up my final set of Interpet PC's last night, they came with some actinic tubes so I am using these on this tank and will replace the bulbs when I swap tanks. Not sure which colour combinations to use yet. At present I have

2x55w T5 PC Interpet Triplus
2x36w T5 PC Actinic.

When I bought the brand new Interpet 2x36w set I purchased 2 Daylight blues where half the tube is daylight and half actinic.

I am tempted to just try the new bulbs over the tank just to see the colour balance. The balance is much better with the PC actinic tubes instead of 2xT8 24w actinics.

How usable to corals is the 36W actinic T5 PC bulbs??