[quote=“bugbabe623, post:160, topic:596”]
Hahaha I’m sorry rawdawg. And yes the stuff I have listed is only the stuff I have mentioned. It came with lots of larger pods, a couple bristles, and I found some chitons today. It was a nutso rock lol. Who knows what else it has on it. Only time will tell.[/quote]
Well now is the time to get yourself a red l.e.d flashlight and a good magifying glass. You’ll be amazed at how much more stuff you’ll see when the lights go out.
I didn’t sleep for a week when I got my first rock. 2 nights b/c I couldn’t stop looking at it, then 5 nights b/c it scared the hell out of me. Kept picturing 6 foot pods crawling out of the tank to eat my brain. >LOCO<
Ok, for the stuff on the zoas, like Jon said just blow them off. If it continues to appear, I would cut off that polyp or 2 and call them a loss, because it could be a brown jelly infection (a type of protozoan) and they can be nasty. Then again it could clear up and you’ll never remember you had it. I think its a symptom of smaller tanks that you look more closley at each polyp, where as in a bigger tank you can lose a coral and not realize it for a month or more… I wouldnt worry to much unless you see these things spreading, however I would probably pick off any eggs that you see. They could be good, but they could also be bad. If they are good the critters will reproduce again even if you get rid of these eggs. If they are bad you could save yourself a big headache.
I think I know what you are talking about for the worms, I always called them peanut worms. They are pretty harmless… actually really good scavengers for detritus so I would leave them. It takes quite a bit to kill zoas… I had some that closed for 3 months after a lighting change before I knew to acclimate to new lighting and they opened up one day a completly different color and totally happy from then on. I dont think anything short of a zoa eating nudi would bother them enough to kill them.
If you want the rock I have about 40lbs in my 15g sump, with a protien skimmer, so alot needs to go. Your more than welcome to come down and pick out what pieces you want… it wont be very expensive since I dont have a scale. Just need to get rid of some of it.
Wow thanks icy! As much as I like the DIY rock that I made, I think it doesn’t look as good as the real deal. I only have 13 lbs in there now, so another 11 or so lbs. That would be pretty nice. What would I need to do with it to prevent anything bad from happening? Would it be ok to just go in the tank or do I need to cycle it in something?
As for the polyps, it looks like 2 have had the issue, other than that I haven’t seen any goo. Maybe the pods or something else took care of it? We shall see.
About the peanut worms, yeah I just read that they can irritate a zoa so much that keeps it closed up, but they seem unphased, they shrink up when they are hit then open back up.
I will attempt the operation on the eggs I guess as long as I get what appears to be the sac off, it should be fine.
The rock came out of a 29g tank that I had left up in NY. That tank has been set up for about 3 years so the rock should be pretty well cycled. Then only thing is it might have some minor algae on it, nothing major (otherwise it wouldnt be in my display sump it would be in a seperate tank) but just thought I would let ya know. All you should need to do to put this in your tank is to bring a 5g pail (i have extras if you need one) to put the rock and a little bit of water in. As long as it stays underwater on the trip to your place you should see no spike in nutrients at all, and probably will see a drop from having more mature LR. How does 20$ sound for a price?
You got a deal. I don’t have a 5 gallon pail, I have a 12 gallon tub. but a pail would probably be better. I could bring some of my water in a 5 gallon jug. After we figure that out then I guess we should figure out the when.
[quote=“Cdangel0, post:161, topic:596”]
I didn’t sleep for a week when I got my first rock. 2 nights b/c I couldn’t stop looking at it, then 5 nights b/c it scared the hell out of me. Kept picturing 6 foot pods crawling out of the tank to eat my brain. >LOCO<[/quote]
:-)lol HAHAHA I know what you mean. When I had the original lid on I had the LEDs on all the time I was just sitting watching the tank. My friend who got me started on the hobby stayed up all night the first night I called her the next morning asking what she did the night before and her reply was “Watching my pet rocks all night is what I did” Best quote ever. The only pet rock that actually is pretty much alive
I have a spare pail that you can have… not sure if it has a lid or not. For water im getting ready to do a water change soon anyways so I’ll plan on doing it the day that you come to pick up the rock and save some in a pail. Let me know when is good with you… if you feel like this week sometime wed is the best for us, but other nights could work too. LMK.
It’s usually a good idea to soak some newspaper in the water to lay across the top of the rock as well. it keeps any of the rock from drying out and keeps the whole container moist.
So my refractometer finally today. It is pretty cool. Very nifty. Definitely a different reading from the hydrometer.
I attempted to get the eggs off but it didn’t work very well. I got a couple off but not a lot. The “goo” I saw on the rock seems to be sponge because when I poked it and tried to pick stuff off it had like a spongy texture.
Unless you already know why you need to wear safety glasses and rubber gloves I wouldn’t suggest fragging.(Google “Zoanthids and Neurotoxins”) With zoas I also wouldn’t suggest fragging every one you have. When you have them for at least a month and they are doing well you can try a little frag of each type and make sure they recover. If you frag them all at once and lose them all then you’ve lost them all. I’m tired not sure if that makes sense…
I haven’t heard of spaghetti worms being a problem. I know they can reproduce fairly easily in captivity and will move around. What colors are the feeding tubes and how many are there?
icy, “I had some that closed for 3 months after a lighting change” second that. Often times they get pissed off and close up for a long time after some change. No reason to go into panic mode. Now if you bought a colony of 50+ polyps of Purple People Eaters and paid $15 a polyp, then you can panic.
+1. I have never heard of spaghetti worms agitating anything. Are the “feelers” amber color or white? I have seen zoas that shrink up for a long time only to open when they are good and ready. I had a large rock of zoas that stayed closed for a year then seem to open over night.
Yes I have read about how zoas have neurotoxins. Yeah I understand about fragging all at once. I’ve already noticed that I have at least one new polyp that has formed. But the two polyps that had the goo on it are degrading. There are pods all over it. It looks like a paly might be getting it too, but it has opened up. If I see another polyp with it then I’m thinking maybe I should frag that polyp off. Because what ever it is is spreading fairly fast.
The spaghetti worms are amber color, I have only seen 2 out at the same time, but they seem to go in and then appear somewhere else really fast. I have a white worm on one rock which I though is what a spaghetti worm was but that one is very slow compared to these worms.
Right family but I beleive it can be narrowed a little further, google Palytoxin
[size=8pt][url=http://www.mdpi.org/marinedrugs/papers/md6020349.pdf]http://www.mdpi.org/marinedrugs/papers/md6020349.pdf[/url]
Palytoxin (PTX)
PTX is a polyhydroxylated compound that shows remarkable biological activity at an extremely
low concentration [96]. This toxin was first isolated from the soft coral Palythoa toxica and
subsequently from many other organisms such as seaweeds and shellfish. Recently, palytoxin was also
found in a benthic dinoflagellate, Ostrepsis siamensis, which caused blooms along the coast of Europe
[97-102], extensive death of edible mollusks and echinoderms [99, 100] and human illnesses [98, 99].
Cases of death resulting from PTX have been reported to be due to consumption of contaminated crabs
in the Philippines [103], sea urchins in Brazil [104] and fish in Japan [105-107]. PTX has become of
worldwide concern due to its potential impact on animals including humans.
PTX is a large, very complex molecule with both lipophilic and hydrophilic regions, and has the
longest chain of continuous carbon atoms in any known natural product (Figure 8 ). Recently several
analogues, ostreocin-D (42-hydroxy-3, 26-didemethyl-9,44-dideoxypalytoxin) and mascarenotoxins
were identified in O. siamensis. PTX is regarded as one of the most potent toxins so far known [108],
the LD50s 24 h after intravenous injection vary from 0.025 μg/kg in rabbits and about the same in dogs
to 0.45 μg/kg in mice, with monkeys, rats and guinea pigs around 0.9 μg/kg. Toxic symptoms include
fever inaction, ataxia, drowsiness, and weakness of limbs followed by death.
Over the past few decades much effort has been devoted to define the action mechanisms of PTXs,
however these have not been identified. Pharmacological and electrophysiological studies have
demonstrated that PTXs act as a haemolysin and alter the function of excitable cells. PTX selectively
binds to the Na+, K+-ATPase with a Kd of 20 pM [109] and transforms the pump into a channel
permeable to monovalent cations with a single-channel conductance of 10 pS [110–113]. Presently,
three primary sites of action of PTXs have been postulated: PTX first opens a small conductance,
non-selective cationic channel which results in membrane depolarization, K+ efflux and Na+ influx.
Subsequently, the membrane depolarization may open voltage dependent Ca2+ channels in synaptic
nerve terminals, cardiac cells and smooth muscle cells, while Na+ influx may load cells with Na+ and
favor Ca2+ uptake by the Na+/Ca2+ exchanger in synaptic terminals, cardiac cells and vascular smooth
muscle cells. Then the increase of [Ca2+li stimulates the release of neurotransmitters by nerve terminals,
of histamine by mast cells and of vasoactive factors by vascular endothelial cells as a signal. It also
induces contractions of striated and smooth muscle cells. Additional effects of a rise in [Ca2+]i may be
activation of phospholipase C [114] and phospholipase A2 [115]. There are reports that PTX opens an
H+ conductive pathway which results in activation of the Na+/H+ exchanger [116, 117]. Other
investigators suggest that PTX raises [Ca2+]i independently of the activity of voltage dependent Ca2+
channels and Na+/Ca’+ exchange [118]. The last two actions might act as the opening of H+ specific
and Ca2+ specific channels. Overall, PTX might posses more than one site of action in excitable cells
and act as an agonist for low conductance channels conducting Na+/K+, Ca2+ and H+ ions.
[size=8pt][url=http://education.med.nyu.edu/courses/advancedscisel/toxicology/courseware/Class2/Marine%20neurotoxins,%20Lancet%20Neuro,%202005.pdf]http://education.med.nyu.edu/courses/advancedscisel/toxicology/courseware/Class2/Marine%20neurotoxins,%20Lancet%20Neuro,%202005.pdf[/url]
Other neurotoxic marine poisoning
Palytoxin, originally found in the zoanthid anemones
Palythoa sp, is among the most potent of toxins.6,96
Palytoxin is a pore forming toxin that has multiple
actions. This toxin causes contraction of smooth and
skeletal muscle and H+ influx into cells, which increases
intracellular Ca+ in cardiac myocytes and haemolysis.96
Poisoning has happened after the ingestion of crabs and
fish that contain palytoxin. Severe muscle and lower
back pain were reported in a recent series of 11 patients
from Japan. Recovery of the patients took over a month
and serum creatine kinase concentrations were high
(700–23 800 IU/L).97
[size=10pt]You should keep a list of the animals you have in your tank, just in case.
If you suddenly have health problems shorty after fragging some corals and you go to the hospital and say I have a saltwater reef tank; they are going to say “that’s nice”. If you say I have a saltwater reef tank with Zoanthids, Palythoas, mushrooms and Xenia corals and they contain varying levels of palytoxins, you may get the help you need.
Who wants to place a bet that I can’t memorize that by the next RC meeting! (Oh wait, I have a life.) Scratch that.
“Toxic symptoms include fever inaction, ataxia, drowsiness, and weakness of limbs followed by death.”
Sounds like fun!
Thats why I have boxes of gloves and 4 pairs of saftey glasses. Ok actually I have 4 pairs of saftey glasses because I kept forgetting to bring mine to lab and would buy another one.
[quote=“a1amap, post:177, topic:596”]
I would bet we could do something if a member could draw that exactly as shown by memory. I personally don’t have that much time but it would be cool.[/quote]
NOOOOO THANKS! I just got out of Organic chemistry and going into Biochemistry! I don’t want any more work like that than what I’m doing soon. lol
Man… I need to get my school supplies… school is starting next week! :o
You got a deal. I don’t have a 5 gallon pail, I have a 12 gallon tub. but a pail would probably be better. I could bring some of my water in a 5 gallon jug. After we figure that out then I guess we should figure out the when. 
lol