Life goes on!!

Thallone · 02-14-2001, 03:14 PM

I have an interesting story for the group, one to give hope to those of you who think things are at their worst for the inhabitants of your tank.

I have had a few self-induced disasters over my 4 years of reef-keeping, and have learned quite a few of the things to avoid. Accidents do, however, still happen.

About 2 months ago, I decided to rid my aquarium of the Carpet-type maco algae that looks so nice but is eaten by nothing and grows over everything. I've seen this stuff survive conditions that seem unbelievable, uncluding 2 months in cold, stagnant, smelly black water with no source of light.(I had recently moved and dodn't get all the rock back in right away.)

there were clearly only a couple things that would kill it, and I decided to try boiling water to kill the algae. I found the perfect applicator, a rubber battery acid fill device that looks like a baster with a 4 inch long tube 1/4th inch in diameter and a large bulb. As I was in the process of my second cleansing, doing the more delicate pieces that had soft corals, mushrooms and the like. I was nearly finished with the process, when my grip slipped on one of the better pieces of carpet coral rock. :-(

Fast thinking and handy tools kept the coral from being in the boiling water for more than a few seconds, but the damage was done. After a day or two, most of the outer tissue sluffed off of the corals, leavind a very small amount of white, spongy tissue from the heart of the corals on the rock.

Well, sometimes I can be an optimist, so I put the rock high in the tank with plenty of current, and lo and behold, there are now polyps beginning to extend from the spongy remains of the corals.

If I had known for sure that this would work, I would have gotten a nicer colored coral in contact early on in the healing process, in an effort to get nicer colored carpet coral. Who wouldn't want a nice, watermellon green carpet?

BTW. the boiling water DID do what I wanted it to.

Please send me any thoughts.

FishDaddy · 02-14-2001, 06:22 PM

Thallone,
I've got some of the red carpet algae, probably Gelidium sp., that nothing seemed to control, even my Mithrax crab.

I decided to try to physically remove as much as possible and to my surprise, it peeled off in big chunks like astroturf! It grows back but I keep it under control by just pulling it off!
Dick

Thallone · 02-14-2001, 06:30 PM

Yep, that's the stuff alrighty. Mine's green, and it was on the top of every rock in the tank. I pruned it down to a couple rocks, and it's STILL propogatin in the tank. Too bad nothing eats it.

mini mee · 02-14-2001, 06:50 PM

Hi Thallone
Glad to hear things worked out for ya and the coral is starting to come back

I have a little story to and it seems to fit the thread title.
The other day wilst I was looking over the tank I noticed a snail hanghing off the intake to my skimmer so I figure lets give him a hand B/C he is obviously stuck so I pull him off the skimmer and drop him into the middle of the Tank well.... within a split second my blue leged crabs dive for it and I am thinking

Ok, no problem I can get him out

just as I go to put my hand in the tank, Godzilla of all brissle worms comes out of his lair

He dives on the snail and starts to rather quickly I might add munch away between the crabs and the worm the snail was doomed

The worm took the snail off to his lair and the blues followed like they were off to a party, in single file no less.

Good thing I rescued the snail eh?
mini mee
PS. Is this a hint that I should maybe feed more to the tank or just try and get ride of Godzilla the brissle worm?
After seeing FishDaddy's pic don't Tangs eat this stuff?

[This message has been edited by mini mee (edited 02-14-2001).]

mini mee · 02-14-2001, 11:00 PM

Ok fellas help me out here as I am not as well versed in algae.
I figure it must be bad so how can I and others avoid it if possible?
or is it a flora that is always present in the nooks and cranys of live rock but takes a certain temp or water condition or whatever to make it appear?

Is this something that happens to older tanks over 1,2 3...years?

I know alot of que's but, I gotta ask

mini mee

Thallone · 02-14-2001, 11:15 PM

The way you get it is to think 'gee, that looks pretty neat' and get some intentionally. I don't know where it comes from, but it really looks great, as long as you don't mind not having anything else to look at in the tank. I can't even reccoment this for refugium use, which would be a great use for it, as it reproduces and spreaads too easily.