Anthias Mouth Stuck Open

When I came home from work today, I was shocked to see my one-eyed yellow eye anthias Pseudanthias lunulatus, Lucky, with his mouth stuck open! Unfortunately, I've heard of and seen this happen to anthias before when they are stressed out, and they usually don't come back from it. I have no idea why this happens, but I've always wondered. I think Lucky may have just been surprised by the door opening abruptly (the tank is right by the front door). Lucky is blind in one eye and often swims full speed into rocks and other objects in the tank, so it's possible he injured his mouth doing that. Luckily, Lucky was able to close his mouth after a few minutes and is eating right now.

It kind of looks like this, when an anthias' mouth is stuck open.

Here's a picture of Lucky right after I brought him home. He was still a little thin in this photo, but he's doing great now.



I've also heard of and seen stressed anthias who bend in the middle and can't straighten themselves. They usually die shortly after. Small anthias are delicate little creatures and should always be handled with great care! Don't expose them to sudden bright lighting, changes in water parameters, aggressive fish, or other stressors. Stress kills anthias.

Columnaris

One of my favorite things to do on vacation is to visit aquarium and pet stores. On a trip to Madison this spring, we picked up a few guppies for our freshwater tank. I hadn't been paying enough attention to my freshwater tanks and only had a few fish left. One was my favorite guppy, a male that was descended from a line of albino magenta pintails crossed with some neon doubleswords and some of my best friend's mutt guppies. He was the last of my guppies, and had no mates.



I added the two new females after a long, careful acclimation. I didn't bother to quarantine them, after all, they're only guppies, right? Wrong. Less than two days later, the new guppies looked like this:



I removed them to a quarantine tank, but they were too far gone. I started doing heavy water changes and maintaining a salt level of about .2% (about one teaspoon per gallon) using freshwater aquarium salt. Within days, my favorite guppy and a number of my other livebearers had succumbed to the disease. I also dosed with Mela Fix, though I'm not sure how effective it was. Perhaps without it, the mortality rate would've been higher. Everyone else has since recovered, but when I added some healthy new fish last month from a private breeder I trust, a few of them contracted what I suspect was columnaris and died shortly after I put them in the tank. Columnaris can stick around for a long time, even though my other fish are not showing symptoms.

Columnaris, Flavobacterium columnare (formerly known as Flexibacter columnaris) is a gram negative bacteria that is not easy to treat. I don't like to use medications, but some popular medications for curing Columnaris are Acriflavine, Furan, and low doses of Formalin. Neomycin and many common antibiotics are not effective. Medications must be used in quarantine tanks because the medications kill the aquarium's ammonia-eating bacteria. Ammonia is much easier to control in a bare tank than in a display tank containing substrate. If you have more than one tank, be careful not to cross contaminate with fish nets, hands, or specimen containers.

If you have any suggestions or questions, feel free to leave a comment. If you've had a Columnaris outbreak in your aquarium and successfully treated it, I'd love to hear from you!

Blue Eyed Crabs

Blue Eyed Crab

Probably the baddest of the bad crabs (for SPS tanks) is the blue eyed crab, Cymo spp. They live on stony corals like Acropora and Pocillopora sp. Unlike most symbionts, these crabs do considerable damage to their hosts. I'm not sure if it's so bad in the wild, but in captivity, these little crabs can quickly kill your prized Acropora colony. I assume they eat the coral's flesh, as they leave dead, white patches in their wake.

My friend Cindy from work shares my sympathy for all things "bad" in the aquarium world, and has adopted countless bad crabs, Stomatopods, and other weird reef-unsafe stuff. She says the blue eyed crabs will eat frozen foods if they don't have a coral to eat (though hers usually do, the spoiled brats). She has some gorgeous bad crabs in many different colors; one is the size of her hand!

red Xanthid crab

 I have a 13 gallon trash can under my aquarium that acts like a sump. There's not much I can put in there, because it's so tall and narrow. I have some Chaeto and other algae in there, but not much else. I started noticing a thin layer of grossness collecting on the bottom, and decided to start collecting "bad crabs" to help clean it up. I already had one bad crab, some kind of red Xanthid crab, shown above. I moved that crab to the trash can sump and have been on the lookout for more bad crabs ever since.

I threw three blue eyed crabs into my trash can sump along with my red Xanthid crab last week. There's enough Chaeto in there to prevent territory disputes, and I'm sure enough food gets to them to scavenge. We'll see how these crabs do in my sump. I'll probably be adopting more"bad crabs" in the future. I'll let you know how it goes.

I found this blog post really interesting, along with having a great photo of one of these beasts, it says that the blue eyed crab in Singapore, Cymo andreossyi, is listed as Vulnerable. Do you need any more reason to throw your bad crabs into the sump instead of your trash can?

Hexagonaria Coral Fossil

I recently got a new fossil, a 350 million year old Hexagonaria sp. coral fossil. (My husband is probably thinking, "Oh, great, now she's collecting dead corals, too.") This particular fossil was collected in the Sahara desert. It's hard to imagine that 350 million years ago, there were oceans in the Sahara and mid-west America where corals of the Hexagonaria genus thrived. It's so interesting to think about; this is the ancient ancestor (or distant cousin) of the modern closed brain corals in our aquariums and oceans. It looks so much like a Montastrea or a Prism coral. Wouldn't it be amazing to go back in time and see this coral when it was alive? What color were its polyps? What was its habitat like? Did it have any symbiotic relationships? We can only imagine.



Macro shot:



Here's a macro of the neon green Favia lizardensis in my coral aquarium for comparison:



Check out more fossil photos on my Flickr page->.

Malachite Secretive Wrasse

I just had to tell someone about this fish. I photographed this Japanese Malachite Secretive wrasse for work today, and I am in love.



Not to anthropomorphize him, but this fish had a lot of personality. The first time I looked at him, he was a completely different color. It wasn't the typical stress pattern that wrasses sometimes get, he was actually bright red, blue, and white mottled all over. But when I approached him to photograph him, he turned this gorgeous yellow-orange color right before my eyes! Just like a chameleon. I've seen plenty of other orange Pteragogus wrasses, but this one was simply stunning. To top of his amazing coloration, he's got super long first and second dorsal spikes. And look at the patterns on his face. Spots and whorls! Plus that beautiful, toothy smile. Who can resist?

He's from Japan, so he prefers cooler water temperatures in the sub-tropical range. If I had a cool water FOWLR tank, this little cutie would be coming home with me. Alas, my tank is full of tiny gobies and seahorses. So I will have to cherish what little time I have left to spend with him. If you buy this fish, I hope you will send me updates on him. He is truly special!

New DFS Blog

Drs. Foster & Smith has unveiled their new pet blog! And I'll be writing for it occasionally. I've written 2 posts for it so far, the first being a quick introduction to my seahorses, but you're all regular readers of Aquarium Adventures and know all about them already. The latest post is all about my 2 year old sun coral (and its babies), in which I give tips on care, feeding, and the magic of reproducing these gorgeous corals (that's right, I said reproduce, not frag).



My boss Kevin is also writing some aquarium-related posts for the DFS pet blog, check out his post on quarantine tanks. My husband Keith, who is a professional writer, will be posting about our parrots and leopard gecko. If you are into dogs, there are lots of posts about dog health, training, and agility. This blog has something for everyone, even Ferret lovers, cat owners, and small pet keepers.

Why are you still here? Go read the sun coral post and share your tips, stories, and comments!

The Deadliest Animal Planet

I was recently contacted by a Mr. Stitchman from Icon Films regarding my photography on Flickr. He said that he was working on Animal Planet's series "River Monsters 2" and was interested in using some of my Sturgeon photos. At first I was really excited that my photos might be used on a huge TV network.



I'm a really positive person by nature, and I don't like to talk badly about anyone. But I can't stand Animal Planet anymore. I remember when I was a kid watching the hard-to-find nature shows on PBS, and when I heard about a new station called Animal Planet, I thought it would be more like that. Instead they have shows about how dangerous and deadly animals are to humans. Every time I turn on Animal Planet, a man with an action-movie-announcer voice is warning us about some deadliest animal in the world (whatever). With these shows, Animal Planet is not educating people as much as they are creating unjustified fear of animals and vilifying animals. It's no longer just "Animal Planet," it's become "the Deadliest Animal" Planet.

I had hoped that "River Monsters" would be different, as Mr. Stitchman said it was about "some of the biggest and most interesting freshwater fish." I Googled it and found some clips on YouTube and was instantly annoyed. Some of the titles include "KILLER CATFISH," "EUROPEAN MANEATER," and "AMAZON FLESHEATERS." I didn't contact them again about those photos. I just couldn't sell myself out. I don't want to be associated with a show like that.

Since when did Animal Planet become a network for horror films about animals? I am not interested in shows that bombard us with rare, freak animal attacks; negatively highlight the contention between humans and animals; and invoke fear of animals in children and other impressionable viewers. If I'm watching a show and hear the words "deadly," "dangerous," and "attack" within the first two minutes, I know to change the channel. Why doesn't Animal Planet show more educational shows, or shows about conservation? Some of my favorite Animal Planet shows are Buggin' with Ruud, Corwin's Quest, Growing Up..., and Orangutan Island. Animal Planet needs more shows like these that advocate conservation, learning, and treating animals with a healthy respect. Sure, those sensational shows about man-eating animals have some merits. At least now I know never to harass a Polar bear, king cobra, or great white shark, should I ever encounter one here in Wisconsin.

Do you agree, or disagree? Feel free to leave a comment and tell us how you feel about Animal Planet.

Shedd Aquarium Tour

My husband and I went to Chicago this week to see one of our favorite bands, Modest Mouse, and to visit the Shedd Aquarium. We got a private tour and got to see some really awesome behind the scenes stuff.



The Caribbean Reef exhibit is the first one you see when you walk into the Shedd. It is absolutely enormous. There were a lot of large Caribbean fish in there like tangs, sharks, porkfish, parrotfish, wrasses, turtles, and a big school of Lookdowns.




I think I spent most of my time in the coral quarantine room. They had a fine collection of neon colored Fungiid corals and some of the biggest and brightest LPS I've seen. I was totally blown away by the group of gorgeous Tridacna crocea clams, soon to be on display.

What really amazed me was that the Shedd has been spawn collecting Acropora palmata corals from the Caribbean. Like all Caribbean stony corals, Acropora plamata is illegal to collect, which is why I've never seen one in person. These larger pieces pictured are about two years old.

I mentioned that it's too bad that A. palmata isn't more colorful, but at least some of the smaller pieces had green or purple colored polyps. They said that A. palmata doesn't have colored polyps in the wild, but after DNA analysis of the symbiotic Zooxanthellae algae (what gives coral its color), they found that the sexually reproduced pieces were taking in Zooxanthellae from Pacific speices of coral. That is what is giving them the colored polyps, and also makes them hardier.

Most public aquariums traditionally had fake corals in their displays, mostly because the corals were too difficult to keep, and so they could treat the displays with copper. Sure, they had reef fish and rubber coral replicas, but not much to offer the seasoned reefer. The Shedd has an exhibit called the Wild Reef, a giant room downstairs with wall-to-wall reef tanks, live coral everywhere! I was also really impressed with the Shedd's collection of Anthias.

I am a little sad that I didn't get to see the seahorse and sea dragon exhibit called "Seahorse Symphony" wich has since moved to Duluth and is now called "Seahorse Secrets." The Shedd has a small collection of seahorses, mostly H. reidi, H. kuda, H. erectus, and H. comes. Most of them were in fairly good condition, which is not bad for a public aquarium. They also had a few nice pipefish and trumpetfish mixed in with the reef tanks. It's hard to impress me with seahorses, but I did enjoy the small sea dragon exhibits. They seemed to be in good health, considering their delicate nature.


I was really upset by one of the other guests at the aquarium who was using his camera's flash to photograph these sensitive animals. There is a large sign next to the tank that says, "NO FLASH PHOTOGRAPHY;" I pointed at the sign and said, literally, "You're not supposed to use your flash on these. It kills them." He glared at me and continued to use his flash. I use my flash on my home aquariums all the time, but I don't do it for 12 hours a day every day. This is why I didn't use my flash at all at the Shedd. It's not good for the fish and animals there to be constantly hit with bright lights. Sea dragons are particularly sensitive to camera flash (or any bright light), it can literally stress them to death. So if you go to the Shedd, don't use your flash, please.

There are a lot of freshwater exhibits, as well. I really enjoyed the Goodeid exhibit and the planted neon tetra tank. I got to meet Steve, one of the aquarists who breeds and cares for the freshwater fish. We thought he was a really cool guy who seemed to be really passionate about his job.



See more photos from my trip on my Flickr Shedd Aquarium set. Also check out the Shedd Aquarium Chicago Flickr Group where you can submit your own Shedd Aquarium photos. THis group is frequented by the Shedd staff and other Shedd Aquarium enthusiasts.

squat lobsters sharing crinoid

I still have the two black Crinoids in my aquarium, but the purple one slowly fell apart and died. The black ones are not doing bad, still extending their arms to feed.

I was surprised last night when I glanced at one of the Crinoids to find that both of my squat lobsters were hosting in it.



Darth Maul, in the lower half of the photo, is a Galathea inflata. He prefers to cling to the rocks underneath a Crinoid. Sometimes he moves to a different Crinoid, and sometimes doesn't stand under one at all. Darth Vader, in the upper portion of the photo, is an Allogalathea elegans. He is always in a Crinoid, usually in the center or on the arms.

Squat lobsters are solitary creatures, so it's unusual to find them sharing a Crinoid. These two have not been fond of one another, either. Darth Maul has chased Darth Vader from his favorite Crinoid before. But it looks like they've made a truce. There is another Crinoid in the aquarium, exactly like this one, but they both prefer this one. They are still sharing this morning, I wonder how long this will last.

Yasha Goby and Red Banded Pistol Shrimp

Last night when I was feeding my fish, I was shocked to see that my Yasha goby has a friend! Kenobie, my Yasha goby, has been alone for over two years now. About a year ago, I bought her an unidentified green pistol shrimp from my LFS; I later ID'd it as Alpheus ochrostriatus. They completely ignored one another. So in February, I got a Wheeler's goby for the pistol shrimp. Kenobie was still all alone, except for her peppermint shrimp friends. In February I bought her an Alpheus randalli, red banded pistol shrimp, which is the pistol shrimp that Yasha gobies are commensal with in the wild. I heard a lot of pistol shrimp popping and shooting, and didn't see the red banded pistol shrimp after that at all. I thought for sure it was killed by the much larger green pistol shrimp. But all is well, and my Yasha has a new pistol shrimp friend!

Felicia's Drs. Foster & Smith Pet Blogs

Seahorse, of Course

by Felicia M. on August 12, 2009

I’m the photographer at Liveaquaria’s Aquaculture Coral and Marine Life Facility, and I’ve always been fascinated by aquatic animals.  Right now I have three aquariums – a chilled “deepwater” aquarium, a coral-only nano bullet tank, and a planted livebearer tank.

My favorite fish are my seahorses, of course.  In the wild seahorses are cryptic and rarely seen, but captive seahorses can be very friendly.  Mine love to hitch on my fingers when I feed them or do tank maintenance.   If you have fish at home, you’ve probably seen them swim at the front of the glass begging for food.  Imagine how funny it is to see a seahorse do that.  Despite being poor swimmers, seahorses are great dancers with elaborate courtship and greeting dances.  They even dance to greet me when I come home.

Contrary to popular belief, captive bred seahorses are not difficult to keep, as long as you are well prepared for them.  They have different requirements and are prone to different diseases than other fish, so you might have to first unlearn what you already know about fish to understand seahorse care.  Seahorse.org is a great place to go if you want to learn more.

I have five seahorses, three females and two males, living in a 55 gallon aquarium with a 20 gallon sump.  Their peaceful tank mates include many small gobies, pipefish, flasher wrasses, non-photosynthetic corals and inverts, and small crustaceans.  I tried photosynthetic corals in this tank, but they were overwhelmed by algae due to the heavy feedings seahorses require and had to be moved to their own tank.  It’s better this way, since now I can have LPS corals and anemones, which are dangerous to seahorses.

You don’t need a lot of expensive equipment for a seahorse aquarium, but in my experience, a reliable chiller is the most important piece of equipment on a seahorse aquarium.  I’m convinced that having a chiller has saved the lives of two of my seahorses and one of my pipefish (more on that later).  I also have a Hydor Performer skimmer, Fluval 405 filter, and compact fluorescent lighting.

In future posts, I’ll be sharing more photos and information about each of my aquariums and what has worked well for me.  I’ll also tell you about some mistakes I’ve made and how you can avoid them.

 by Felicia M. on February 1, 2010

If you’re an aquarist, you probably have a preference for a certain type of fish. Some people like little peaceful fish, some like big aggressive fish, and others like rare oddball fish. I’ve always been inclined toward small, weird, peaceful fish like Seahorses and Curious Wormfish. I never imagined myself wanting a large predator like a Lionfish until I met “Serendipity.”

Serendipity is a Yellow Dwarf Fuzzy Lionfish (Dendrochirus brachypterus). I know Serendipity is a female because she has only five bars on her pectoral fins; males have more. Yellow is a rare color for this type of fish, and she is a gorgeous shade of yellow. In addition to her yellow fins, she has beautiful blue eyes and reddish-brown bars on her body.

Serendipity is the only fish in the coral tank I keep in my kitchen. I think she likes being in the kitchen as she gets lots of attention and can be where the action is. She has been outgoing and friendly since day one. If I am looking into the tank, there is usually a curious little Lionfish face right in front of what I’m trying to look at. I suppose I wouldn’t be afraid of anything either if I were that venomous. I have to be careful when I work in my tank so that I don’t bump into her venomous spines. If I am stung, I’ll put the affected area into water that is as hot as I can stand it, and that may help deactivate the venom. If not, I’d have to take a trip to the ER.

Serendipity is also unusual for a Lionfish because she eats frozen food. Most Lionfish will only eat live foods. The “fish guys” here at LiveAquaria’s Aquaculture Coral and Marine Life Facility do their best to try to train the large predatory fish to eat frozen foods like frozen silversides and krill before being sold on Diver’s Den. I was lucky that Serendipity learned to eat frozen food.

I feed her a diet of mostly thawed, cut up silversides three times a week. Sometimes she gets a piece of krill as a treat since a diet of krill only has been reported as a cause for lockjaw in large predatory fish. I use a blunt bamboo stick to transfer the food to her. I impale the food on the end then wiggle the food in the water to entice her. She swims up to the food and pauses for a moment while flaring and vibrating her fins before striking. I try to let the food go off the stick in front of her face right before she strikes so she doesn’t hurt her mouth on the stick. We both have to have perfect timing or else the food floats to the bottom of the tank where she won’t eat it and I’ll have to get it out.

Do you have a Lionfish or other large predatory fish in your aquarium? We’d love to hear about it!

by Felicia M. on January 14, 2010

I was walking through our Aquaculture Coral & Marine Life Facility the other day when a beautiful coral caught my eye. It was a Heteroxenia, a soft coral closely related to Xenia. Usually Heteroxenia spp. are tan or silver, but this one was purple! I soon found out that this was going to be a new Drs. Foster & Smith Certified Captive Grown Coral frag.

It’s exciting when we offer a new aquacultured coral frag; everyone is involved with fragging, caring for, or naming the new coral. It’s not easy coming up with a catchy name that captures the color and form of the coral. I’m not very creative, so I usually try to leave the naming to my more creative co-workers. Chris M. and I were looking at the coral when we both said, “This coral sure does look like an Octopus.” That’s when it hit me – Octopus ink is purple, and each polyp of this coral has eight tentacles, just like an Octopus! That’s why we decided to call it the Octopus Ink Heteroxenia.

The brand new Octopus Ink Heteroxenia is for sale right now on Liveaquaria.com. I have some Pumping Xenia in my home aquarium that I find to be relatively hardy and fast-growing, so you can bet I’ll soon be buying one of these beauties.

Leave a comment and tell us what you think of the new Octopus Ink Heteroxenia.

Seahorse Personality

by Felicia M. on November 2, 2009

It’s hard to think of fish as having personalities or being interactive.  Before I had seahorses I thought they were neat looking, but I just assumed they sat around and didn’t actually DO anything all day. After caring for my seahorses for over a year now, I feel they are “pets” more so than any other fish I’ve ever kept. I’m certainly not going to claim that seahorses are intelligent, because, well, they’re not. However, they definitely have what I call personality.

Unlike other fish, seahorses have a prehensile tail they use to hitch themselves to rocks and plants. This strange appendage is what enables their unique, laid-back fish lifestyle. They are able to use their tails to hold perfectly still while hunting. Their tails also make it easy for them to keep in close contact with their friends, as you can see in the photo above. They aren’t in stealth mode all the time, though. They aren’t the best swimmers, but they love to swim, dance, and play.

My favorite seahorse is a little erectus named Kuiter (named after the biologist, of course). I’m convinced that Kuiter recognizes me and knows who I am (the mysis dispenser!). She follows me around as I work on the tank, swimming against the glass as close as she can get to me. Kuiter even likes to hitch on my fingers. I attribute this behavior partly to the fact that she is captive bred. Captive bred seahorses are used to humans and can become very friendly. This has been helpful on a few occasions when I had to handle Kuiter to medicate her. If she wasn’t used to my hands, the stress from the situation could have been fatal.

Inter-seahorse relationships are pretty complex and fascinating. I have two boys, Juniper and Debelius; and three girls, Ellis, Hoover, and you already know Kuiter.

Hoover and Kuiter, the two youngest and smallest females, are best friends and always together. They are the two most playful seahorses, always holding onto each other’s tails. My seahorses seem to enjoy holding tails with each other, like people hold hands. But apparently, it is extremely impolite for a seahorse to hitch on another seahorses’s face, body, or neck. Kuiter has a bad habit of doing this, especially to Hoover. Hoover will shake and buck wildly until Kuiter gets the hint to let go.

Juniper and Ellis, the largest and oldest, are a mated pair. He makes time every dawn to dance with Ellis and strengthen their pair bond. They have a flowing, elegant dance. Juniper turns silver and does pouch crunches while Ellis turns a lovely reddish shade. The two of them circle each other while lifting their heads like trumpets and ascending to the water’s surface. The actual courtship dance is even more elaborate, ending with Ellis depositing eggs into Juniper’s pouch.

Debelius is a young adult male, having recently developed his pouch. Debelius dances with all the girls! He used to dance with Ellis a lot, but realizing he’s no match for Juniper, has turned his attentions lately to Hoover and Kuiter. In my opinion, Debelius is a terrible dancer. His movements aren’t graceful at all. Instead, he turns a yellowish-white color, grabs a girl’s tail (or head, whatever’s available) with his tail, and starts shaking violently. I’ve never seen anyone mate with him, or spend much time around him, so apparently they’re not all that impressed with his dancing skills, either. Maybe he’ll learn some better dance moves from watching Juniper.

This may all sound pretty far-fetched to someone who’s never had seahorses, so if you are a seahorse keeper, back me up! Please leave a comment and tell us about your seahorse’s personality.

Roborovski Hamsters – Smallest Hamsters in The World

by Felicia M. on October 15, 2009

The Roborovski dwarf hamster is the smallest hamster in the world, maxing out at just under 3 inches long. This isn’t the only thing that makes “Robos” unique. They have the longest lifespan of any other pet hamster, up to 3-1/2 years. I also find their white eyebrows to be extremely endearing.

I started my own Robo family in 2007 with a pair named Reepicheep and Ratatouille. I read that Robos enjoy each other’s company and do well in groups, so I decided to breed them. When they were old enough, they had 2 litters of 4 babies each. They got along well, with a noisy little scuffle every now and then, until the first litter of babies was almost a year old.

They started fighting constantly, even causing some serious wounds. Before I knew it, I had hamsters in seven different Crittertrails and an aquarium. I was baffled by my hamster family’s fighting, so I decided to talk to other Robo owners and found that many were having similar aggression issues. Luckily, all my co-workers love animals; it wasn’t hard to find homes for my Robos. I tried in vain for months to discover who was compatible by using cage dividers, trial, and error. Ratatouille even started chasing Reepicheep and had to be separated. The females all had to be re-homed individually, because apparently, they don’t like company at all. The males were less aggressive; some paired up easily. I kept two of the brothers, Felix and Mookie, who have proven to be peaceful friends.

My Robos are very energetic and playful, running almost constantly when awake or not eating. Robos are the fastest of the pet hamsters and need a lot of room to exercise. (Notice in the photo, he’s running so fast his feet aren’t even touching!) I keep my two males in a 55 gallon aquarium with two wheels, and this seems to be enough for them. They are awake during the day more often than other hamsters, but are still mostly nocturnal. I am an extremely light sleeper, but don’t worry - the Silent Spinner wheels they have are absolutely noiseless.

I’ve never been bitten by one of my Robos, but they are super squirmy and don’t hesitate to jump out of my hand every chance they get. I am very careful and try to only handle them in their cage. They don’t seem to mind being touched and petted on the rare occasion they’re not running at full speed.

Their fur is thick and soft, and like other hamsters, they groom obsessively. If their fur starts to look oily, I let them roll around in some Critter Bath Powder. They appear to really enjoy these dust-baths, and it’s an interesting natural behavior to observe.

Robos are really different from all the other hamster species I’ve kept. Their high activity level makes them fun to watch, but difficult to handle and play with. I don’t think they’d make good pets for younger children for that reason. An older, more mature child (or adult) who would rather watch them than pick them up might be a better Robo keeper.

Roborovski hamsters have only been available to pet owners in the U.S. for a few years, so not a lot is known about them yet. If you have a Roborovski hamster, please leave a comment. I would love to hear about your experiences.

Corals bright as the sun

by Felicia M. on September 9, 2009

my sun coral

I’ve been the proud owner of a sun coral since I found a black and orange combo sun coral at my local store in June 2007. The orange side, a Tubastrea coccinea, was in very good health with plump, fleshy polyps. It even extended its polyps in the take-home bag. The black side, a Tubastrea micrantha, wasn’t in too bad shape, but it did have some tissue recession between the polyps, which is common. It just needed some TLC.

When deciding where to place my new coral, I knew it was most important to put it where I could easily target feed each polyp. I target feed my sun coral daily with thawed mysis shrimp and Cyclop-Eeze, making sure after feeding to squirt food out from between the polyps where it can decay. When I first brought it home, it was reluctant to open. I trained it to open at the same time every evening by gently squirting it with small, meaty foods and “mysis juice,” the soupy part of a frozen mysis cube. Now that it’s comfortable, it opens every evening at dinnertime. I used to have a shrimp that stole food right out of the sun coral’s polyps, so I cut the bottom off a plastic water bottle and used it to cover the coral during feeding.  A hole drilled into the lid allowed me to squirt food from a syringe into the bottle.

Sun corals are non-photosynthetic, so light is of little importance to them. If the lighting is too bright, though, algae can grow around the coral or on its exposed skeleton and choke the coral. Sun corals like moderate, alternating flow and often won’t open if the flow is too slow.  In the wild these corals live on warm, bright reefs and in the cooler, deeper waters beyond. This is why they can adapt well to different environments. I’ve kept mine as low as 65°F, but average about 70°F. Most sun coral keepers maintain them at normal reef temperatures, up to 78°F. They are quite sensitive to high nitrates and poor water quality, and need supplemented Calcium and trace elements to grow.

baby sun corals

A few months after I brought this coral home, I started noticing tiny black and yellow polyps scattered on my live rock. I did some research and discovered that sun coral colonies are hermaphroditic, containing both male and female polyps. A male polyp fertilizes a female polyp’s egg, then she broods the larvae inside until it is ready to be expelled and swim to its new location. The tiny larvae attaches to a rock to start building its own colony. I am finding new ones all the time in my aquarium; it is certainly a task to target feed all of them. I hope that any baby sun corals living in the caves I can’t reach are getting enough passing Cyclop-Eeze to survive.

Almost Finished Renovations

I finally finished moving my aquariums around the kitchen. The 55 gallon with the 20 gallon sump is now home to all the reef fish, inverts, non-photosynthetic corals, and seahorses. The 25 gallon nano bullet tank is now a coral-only tank. The 37 gallon, which used to be the seahorse tank, is now a planted guppy and Limia tank. I usually go to bed pretty early, but some night I'll try to stay up past dark and get a shot of all three tanks with the lights off in the kitchen so you don't have to look at my refrigerator.



I had to combine the two saltwater tanks and was nervous at first about how everyone would get along. So far, there haven't been any major problems. There was a squat lobster confrontation, however, on the first day. Darth Maul, the Galathea inflata, evicted Darth Vader, the Allogalathea elegans, from its favorite black Crinoid. In the wild, Darth Vader would have been eaten immediately without the protection of a Crinoid. So it felt that it had to move quickly to the nearest Crinoid, which happened to be my newest Crinoid, a purple one. It was obvious that Darth Vader did not like the purple Crinoid much, because it made its way to the nearest uninhabited black Crinoid soon after. Darth Maul, the Galathea inflata, does not live on the center of the Crinoid like Darth Vader does. Instead, it stands on the rock underneath the Crinoid's outstretched arms.



What I found interesting is that the short, tufted antennae on either side of its rostrum were pointed toward the Crinoid the whole time it was travelling toward it. I wonder if commensal squat lobsters use those to chemically sense, or smell Crinoids. I wish I knew what those little antennae, circled in red on the picture at left, were called.



I found this pretty Zoanthus gigantus rock at my local store. Since I was good at the doctor and didn't hit the anesthesiologist this time, my husband let me buy it. For this photo, I tried out my new surface viewer while the coral was in acclimation. I think it turned out pretty well.

The light fixture I won from a raffle is kind of broken. Only some of the bulbs light up now. That's ok, since this is a non-photosynthetic tank now, and the hair algae is dying. Both the actinics light up, which looks pretty nice. Here's my sea cucumber under actinic lighting. It's still doing well and eats phytoplankton every day. It's difficult to tell since they change shape so much, but I think it has grown. It definitely hasn't gotten smaller. You can also see in the photo a small, white tuft coming out around the mouth. Since taking this photo last week, it has grown into a regular sized feeding tentacle. I don't think the animal hasn't lost any tentacles, so I wonder why it's growing new ones.

Lost my Scooter

One of my favorite fish jumped out of the tank and died Saturday night. This isn't the first time he's done it, either. I have pond netting covering the holes in my canopy, but there is a tiny space where the filter intake pipes hang on the tank. He must have found his way through that space, because I found him on the floor just underneath the filter. He wasn't completely dried out, so I threw him back in the tank, hoping he'd revive. Unfortunately, he didn't.

I'm really bummed out about it. I liked this fish a lot. It's such a shame that he died so needlessly, because he was very healthy and fat. I had him since he was only a little more than an inch long, and he was about 3 inches when he died.

Livebearing Marine Brotulids

I've always been fascinated by livebearing fish like guppies, so when I discovered Brotulids, I had to know more about this odd, cryptic fish.

The most common species in the hobby is the yellow dusky Brotulid, otherwise known as a yellow eel goby. They're easy to care for and not picky eaters. They do best in small, peaceful aquariums with easily accessible places to hide, like PVC pipes and flowerpots. They should be target fed, since they are so shy. In large aquariums with a lot of rockwork, they can't be target fed and may starve.

I bought my first yellow dusky Brotulid in March 2008. I put him into my reef aquarium with over 90 pounds of live rock where he promptly dove under a rock pile never to be seen again. A few months later, I bought another one and put her in my seahorse aquarium which has low lighting and little live rock. She lives inside of a rock that is shaped like a cave. I can easily see her, but sometimes I have to use a small flashlight. She is almost constantly in movement, hovering inside her cave while undulating her beautiful, ribbon-like fins. She has become much less shy and even pokes most of the way out of her cave to eat thawed frozen mysis shrimp alongside my seahorses. She is not picky about what she eats and took to frozen food right away. She lives with my two female Orange Eel Gobies, which are a similar species. All three of them are very social with one another and share a cave. Strangely, they also share their cave with my Curious Wormfish, who is very similar to them in behavior and body shape. She is extremely peaceful and doesn't bother any of the small crustaceans or fish that share her tank. Even the squat lobster and Trimma gobies are safe with her.

Sexing this species of Brotulid is a little different than sexing other species. The males of most Brotulid species have large, visible claspers at the beginning of the anal fin. The male yellow Brotulid has a fleshy, crescent shaped pouch which contains his rounded claspers and sexual organs. The female (pictured here) is similar to females of other species in that they have a tiny "knob" at the front of the anus. Breeding this species in captivity might prove to be as easy as breeding freshwater livebearers. The young are large and highly developed when they are born. Unfortunately, there isn't a high demand for this cryptic species, so aquaculture facilities are not breeding them. There have been reports from hobbyists that some Brotulids eat bristleworms, which are a nuisance to aquarists. If this claim can be validated, that would make this species more popular with hobbyists.

These fish have gone by many scientific names including Dinematichthys riukiuensis, Brotulina fusca, and Diancistrus fuscus. No one is entirely sure which scientific name is valid for the little yellow Brotulids that sometimes show up in the aquarium trade. According to fishbase.org, Brotulina fusca is no longer a valid name, and is replaced by and a synonym of Diancistrus fuscus. Fishbase.org goes on to say that Brotulina fusca is very rare and known only from a single male specimen. It seems unlikely, but not impossible, to me that such a rare species would regularly make it into the aquarium trade. I think that these yellow Brotulids we see in the aquarium trade are more likely in the genus Dinematichthys. I recently came across this photo of a Dinematichthys randalli while doing a Google search. This is the closest I've ever come to positively identifiying my little Brotulid.

The best information I've found on these awesome fish so far has been from a German website called www.seahorsemania.eu. This is what they have to say (translated loosely into English):

"The following photos and info on the animal, comes courtesy of Martin Reith, Freiburg - www.seahorsemania.eu

This very unusual fish, Freiburg shop "Under Water" photographs, where several rare animals for sale. The Yellow bearded Brotulid is considered "Brotulina fusca" in the aquarium trade, but the current Latin name is Diancistrus fuscus. Hardly a rarity these aquarists will have ever seen, so a few additional details:

Assignment and kinship:

The Yellow bearded Brotulid is the family of livebearing Brotulas (Bythitidae) in order Ophidiiformes (like fish entrails / male-like beard) and is therefore associated with the widely-style cod (Gadiformes) related. Fishes of the order Ophidiiformes are mainly deep-water fish and this is also the reason why most divers and aquariums are not yet familiar with members of this order. The only members of this order, the little known, are the bizarre fish viscera (Family Carapidae) in the body of live sea cucumber.

In the family of livebearing Brotulas (Bythitidae) in addition to marine fish and a few representatives that live in anchialinen caves (caves where freshwater and saltwater mix). To mention are the genera Typhliasina, lucifuga and Ogilbia from cave systems in Central America as well as in various groups of islands in the western Atlantic and eastern Pacific. From the genus Diancistrus come here next to the imagined nature, even (still rare) reddish colored fish on the market. They are traded as Brotulina Erythrea, it could therefore possibly be Diancistrus erythraeus.


Verbreitung und Lebensraum:

The Yellow bearded Brotulid Diancistrus fuscus lives in the western Pacific in southern Japan, Taiwan and the northern half of the Philippines. To the south of the equator it is replaced by "Allen's bearded Brotulid" Diancistrus alleni. The Yellow bearded Brotulid was rarely observed free-living, it probably lived in shallow waters up to 20 meters in depth, well hidden in columns of coral reefs.


Posture and nutrition:

When it comes to attitude, we can only give rough recommendations because we have little experience with this species. For the welfare of the Yellow Bearded Brotulid in the aquarium, a large number of crevices and caves are needed, since the animals in nature predominantly reside in in columnar systems. Since the diet of these animals still as good as nothing is known, however, should first try to get these animals in a darkened aquarium with very little possibilities to keep hiding in order to be able to observe what food they take. The above-mentioned with the Yellow Beard related fish from anchialinen caves are known to eat several small crustaceans. Yellow Beard Brotulids may eat small copepods and Mysis shrimp. Pair or group housing would be recommended so that the very interesting reproductive behavior and the largely unknown social behavior can be observed.


Reproduction:

The animals are livebearing fish and have an internal fertilization. The males have in a belly fold a penis and pair of claspers similar to those of rays and sharks. The females live bring juveniles to the world. Perhaps Yellow Beard Brotulids are especially easy to breed.


Abstract:

The Yellow Bearded Brotulid is a rarely traded, and highly interesting from an unusual fish group, their way of life is still very little known. Even the exceptional reproduction suggests that the biologically interested aquarists, who is a Artbecken up a lot of sensational observations can be. The very hidden way of life make the Yellow Bearded Brotulid unsuitable for aquarium fish in their normal set, mixed reefs aquarists often want to see."

Don't Do This

I have had a pretty terrible week so far. I spent yesterday in the hospital for a minor outpatient procedure. After explaining my severe needle-phobia to my anesthesiologist, he still managed to fail to properly insert the IV not once, but twice.

Very early this morning I awoke with alarm as my husband shook me awake saying, "Honey, you need to get up, the aquarium is overflowing." How could this happen? I admit it is totally my fault. I have the necessary check valves and clamps, brand new, in a bag under my aquarium stand. I've just been procrastinating about installing them.

As you can see from the extremely cluttered photo at the left, the return pump has no hose clamp. It is just dangling precariously from the end of the hose. Don't ever do that. It's bad. It's hard to see in this photo because it's obscured by the hose in front, but also take note of the extremely long outlet elbow. It reaches below the water level to about a third of the way down on the main aquarium. Don't do that, either, especially if you don't have a check valve on your outlet hose.

Even if you're not a physicist, you can probably tell from the photo and the description what happened very early this morning to my aquarium. The hose disconnected from the return pump, causing water from the 55 gallon main tank to siphon down into the 37 gallon sump on the floor. If there had been a hose clamp, the hose wouldn't have disconnected from the return pump. If the outlet elbow wasn't so long, it would've stopped siphoning once the water level sunk below it. If I had installed the check valve, it wouldn't have siphoned at all. I knew all of that was possible, which is why I have those hose clamps and check valves under my stand. But you can't change someone's true nature. I'm still a procrastinator, and guess what I'm doing rignt now instead of installing them...

The silver lining? the 20 gallons of water on my floor didn't do any lasting damage. It stopped inches from my computer tower and cell phone.