Who eaten my mushrooms?

[tramsden]

Last week I bought a piece of rock with 6 mushrooms attached ( Actinodiscus sp or similar ). Today I notice that the rock is without mushrooms, this dissapearance has happened in the past couple of days .. I assume that they have been eaten by one of the tank inhabitants,

Who is the likely culprit..

The " known " livestock list is....

Majestic angel
dwarf flame angel
kole tang
naso tang
yellow tang
scarlet hawkfish
6 line wrasse
algae blennie
perc clown
royal gramma

cleaner shrimp
blood shrimp

orange serpent starfish

hermit crabs
mithrax crab

snails..

Any suggestions welcome..

.. Tony

[Travis L. Stevens]

my guess would be one of the angels, but I truthfully dont know. What are youre water parameters? When mushrooms die, they can nuke and be completely gone in a matter of hours. I had a 2 inch across rhodactis mushroom nuke and have no signs of it in a matter of 3 hours. So it could be either something ate it, or they nuked. With how old the tank sounds to be, my guess is something ate it though

[northbay-reefer]

I've witness the camel back shrimps and the pepermint shrimps eating mushrooms before so my guess would be one of your shrimps that ate it

[tramsden]

My setup is 15+ months and all the water parameters fairly good, thats why I suspected that they were eaten..

SG=1.026
temp=79
pH 8.2-8.35
Nh4,NO2,PO4=0
NO3 trace
Ca=430 dKH=8
Mg=1350..

I've never seen any fish taking an interest in the mushrooms but ofcourse that doesn't mean anything..


.. Tony

[Travis L. Stevens]

Isn't dKH of 8 rather low? I thought it was supposed to be about 10...maybe I need to go home and test for that really soon.

[GSchiemer]

Originally posted by Travis L. Stevens
Isn't dKH of 8 rather low? I thought it was supposed to be about 10...maybe I need to go home and test for that really soon.

A dKH of "8" is perfect. The typical recommendation is between 7 & 10.

The logical guess, as to what ate your mushrooms, is the Majestic Angel; although they usually don't eat mushrooms. I'm assuming that your "hermit crabs" are the typical small algae-eating variety?

Greg

[Travis L. Stevens]

You might want to watch out for the next few days to see if they are walking across your tank....Gotta love those hitch hiking decorator crabs. ...jk

[Smo]

Nobody ate them. ;)

Did you have a powerhead pointed at them?
Were they in a high flow area?

Mushrooms don't like very bright lights, nor moderate flow. They will relocate to a happier place.

[tramsden]

Smo

Perhaps your right, well I hope that you are..
the area I placed them I suppose might be regarded has having moderate lights and flow, they were at the bottom of the tank ,but I can see that perhaps it might have been a little too bright and breezy for them.

.. Tony

[Gawain1974]

I'd camp out in front of my tank late at night with a flashlight after the lights are out to check for any unwanted hitchikers. I've kept a majestic angel (small one) with mushrooms in the past, and he never bothered them, but you never know with angels. My mushrooms migrate sometimes, but I've never had a mass exodus, and I was always able to locate them in their new location. I hope you don't have a gorilla crab, or other shroom eating bully, in there playing Moses and leading your mushrooms to the "promised land" (i.e. his belly).

[wentreefgirl]

Dont know what your setup looks like but if you can, can you lift up rocks or see under them. Mushrooms tend to fall off and relocate when they arent happy with where they are placed. I have the worst luck keeping my mushrooms where i can see them. I got one of those mushroom maddness rocks with like 20 on a rock all different colors and species and I think there are 5 left on it. All have relocated.

[gruiz1122]

I second what gawain said. Depending on where your live rock came from you might have a polyp eating worm in your tank that can consume zoa's and 'shrooms. They also get to be almost 10 feet or longer! So camp out in front of your tank at night with a flashlight with a red filter on it so you don't spook anything and watch for anything that might be a suspect!

[Gawain1974]

Yeah....is this what is coming to mind?

http://www.oregonreef.com/sub_worm.htm

[mightymouse]

id be willing to bet money its the mithrax i had one eat my mushrooms and encrsuting gorgonian so i had to get rid of him

[waterdog1]

I had some shrooms detach from their base and end up attached to the sand the other side of the tank. I didnt think they could do that. It was 3 shrooms on a rock..just lifted off

[wentreefgirl]

Actually I have had both the scrooms jump off and move to another destination and I had a mithrax I cought with his hands in the goodies. He was eating my polyps. He was gone as soon as i cought him.

Tramsden, did you have an sucess locating them?

[tramsden]

No look in finding the mushrooms relocated elsewhere in the tank, My mithrax is quite a size, he does look like hes had a few good meals, maybe the shrooms are a favourite of his...
I'm keeping my eye on him...

.. Tony

[chevegan]

i don't now. I never had problems wiht my Mithrax. I did get rid of him because the idiot would knock all my corals over! But other than that he loved to eat the food that would fall, never anything else. i hate crabs and shrimps in a reef. GO SNAILS!