acanthastrea pics...lets see em!

[bugsy714]

meaty foods; mysis, squid, krill, oyster eggs, and some people use cyclopleeze but I'm starting to stay away from it

[Vili_Shark]

Hi Bugsy
why are ya staying away from Cyclop-eeze?

[bugsy714]

I & several other reefers have noticed the lords just slime up when you feed the cyclo, then they release a long booger with cyclo in the gel. I think they release this mucous because the cyclo doesn't dissolve, or it creates a defense response.

try replacing cyclo with oyster eggs, they are pricey but you've never seen your lords' coat shine like that before

[eraml]

Aight so i have a 20gallon high tank with 2x65watt Pc's, is that enought lighitng?
What kind of water flow do they like?
And do they require spot feeding?
If i like gave them some Formula 1 and/or Frmula 2 food when feeding my fish would that be enough food for them?

[bugsy714]

Lighting will be fine for excellent growth

Feeding- you will need to directly feed them at least once a week with the foods listed above. The more you feed the faster they grow

Flow-they like all types of flow except direct, high flow, they can be down on the sand in dead water or up on the rock in medium flow

[eraml]

Alright, are they a threat to sting an other nearby corals?
And where can i get some of the foods that were listed above?
Anyone have any frags that they are willing to sell?

[organism]

they can definitely sting corals you put them close to, they're pretty agressive, and you can find mysid, chopped squid, and other meaty foods at your local lfs most likely

[Vili_Shark]

Bugsy
Did you have the same expirience with other LPS as well?

[Duce]

Originally posted by organism
they can definitely sting corals you put them close to, they're pretty agressive, and you can find mysid, chopped squid, and other meaty foods at your local lfs most likely

They are also very very tough....my frag falled on top of a Ric for at least a few hours and it recovered. I don't think I have seen any corals that can survive that.

[CodeToad]

*quietly joins the club*

[RandyO]

Nice piece Matt.

I also have stopped feeding cyclopeeze, as I noticed the slime thing.

eraml,
Reef Central probably has the most information anywhere on Acanthastrea. It's right at your fingertips. All you have to do is type Acanthastrea in the Search option. That should keep you busy for a few months.

[bugsy714]

Randy-Have you switched to oyster eggs yet? They are like a multivitamin for your coral--pure nutrition

I still feed cyclo to the tank in genral, just don't hose my lords with it
I have an lps dominated display and a zoo/lps/softy frag tank attached to eat up all of my extra food.

I have found that foodstuffs taken from the ocean are just better for coral than freshwater shrimp like mysis

[RandyO]

Originally posted by bugsy714

I have found that foodstuffs taken from the ocean are just better for coral than freshwater shrimp like mysis

I couldn't agree more.

And to answer your question, no I haven't tried oyster eggs yet. I'll get around to it soon though.

[TippyToeX]

What an outstanding piece Matt!!

OK, I have a questions to the Acan Lord keepers. Recently I have found two teeny-tiny individual polyps on the sand bed. I was rooting around the tank moving my blastos around, when I saw a speck of red. Thought nothing of it and waited for the tank to clear up. There it was, that little speck of red again. I looked real close and it was a lord polyp. Then I found another yesterday! I'll snap some pics tonight.

Anyone else have that happen?

FWIW, the oyster eggs are wonderful. I just recently tired it.

[bugsy714]

Hi Amy

Were those spawn from a randyo red/green or red/grey? I have never heard of that with lords, but I know of people finding mini sunpolyps everywhere on thier rock Randy's lords are the only ones prolific enough to do something like that!

[RandyO]

Hi Amy.
Myself and my buddy with all the Acans have experienced this. It's like a polyp bail out. I'm not sure if it's from an injury or not, but a tiny piece of skeleton becomes detached from the main colony. The flesh is still attached at this point. Slowly, the skeleton starts to droop, pulling some flesh away with it. Eventually, the flesh breaks away from the mother colony, and the new polyp falls to the sand. The probelm we've had is then doing something with this piece of polyp that is fully surrounded by flesh. I've tried to glue it to the rock, but it did not take, and floated away. I know it's in my tank somewhere. I wish I had some pictures of the drooping flesh. Although, it was not a pretty sight to see your prized coral looking like it was falling apart.

Rignt now I am holding my buddy's corals, and he has a couple of these that took, and are now glued to a small piece of rock.

[bugsy714]

That's too cool, we had a drooper a while back, it's like we fractured the skeleton when we cut it and 2 weeks later it was dangling off. I saw it drop but spaced on it. I wonder if it's still roaming the tank somewhere...

[TippyToeX]

Good info Randy. That was more to my thinking, about a broken piece that might just have floated off after a fragging. I put my frags down on the sandbed to recover, so that makes a good amount of sense. Too cool. I'll just leave it be and see if it will develop a skeleton on it's own. I have yet to touch the little thing (I'm so klutzy I'd make it float off to the CL intake )

Hey Bugsy, I'd wager it is still somewhere in there!

I'm off to take a pic of the little guy.

[bugsy714]

Yeah-- pix pix!

[baja_01]

I have had a good reaction using a fine cheese grader and some frozen shrimp. Then I use a small feeding syringe to shower the polyps when their feeding tenticles are out. They LOVE it.

I also feed crushed up prime reef as a staple, but nothing make them eat like raw seafood.

[bugsy714]

a mini cheese grater, I'm gonna have to see if that works for squid, good tip baja!!!!

[baja_01]

Make sure it is frozen hard though, otherwise is gets messy

[Freed]

When do you notice that the feeding tentacles are out most often? Night? Day? How often?

[sschafer]

Seems like the feeding tentacles are only really out at night on my Acanthastrea. My Micromussa, on the other hand, seem to have feeding tentacles out almost all the time. The Micro is eating like crazy and I have three or four baby polyps after only a couple weeks.

-Steve

Originally posted by Freed
When do you notice that the feeding tentacles are out most often? Night? Day? How often?

[RandyO]

Originally posted by sschafer
Seems like the feeding tentacles are only really out at night on my Acanthastrea. My Micromussa, on the other hand, seem to have feeding tentacles out almost all the time. The Micro is eating like crazy and I have three or four baby polyps after only a couple weeks.

-Steve

I have the same experiences that Steve has. My lords open at night, but my Micro likes to stay open all the time. My lords will open during the day if I introduce food. But they don't open all the way. Just enough to feed. At night they turn inside out.