xenia is gone...

[bighitrider45]

so i was told that you are not supposed to glue xenia to a rock becaus eit kills them, so last night i clamped them inbetween two rocks, and this morning they are gone, i took apart my lr 3 times trying to find it!! i looking in my skimmer and, its nowhere to be found, does anyone have any suggestions on where it might have drifted off too. Or is it possible that my damsel ate it...lol

 

[spongebob lover]

hmm did you look in your powerheads dood?

 

[returnofsid]

Chances are it's drifted deep in the rocks...lol. When that happens, it sometimes totally closes up, making it pretty hard to find. I'd leave all the rockwork alone and watch for it. Chances are, it'll expand in the next day or so and you'll have a better chance of seeing it. When you do find it, try sticking a toothpick through it's stock and then into live rock. That works pretty good with most soft corals.

 

[bighitrider45]

not yet but wouldnt it have been shreddded up and spit back out?

 

[bighitrider45]

ohh okay thanks sid and spongebob lover

 

[Wieselsport]

I just rubberband them to rocks and sometimes in less than a day they are attaching. i give them 3 days in a low flow area and they always stick. Make sure the rubberband is tight.

 

[Cwazy Clown]

yea and if it did get sucked in ur powerhead, you might see like huindreds of new xenia in a month or so. so beware.

 

[Fishead77]

so i was told that you are not supposed to glue xenia to a rock becaus eit kills them, so last night i clamped them inbetween two rocks, and this morning they are gone, i took apart my lr 3 times trying to find it!! i looking in my skimmer and, its nowhere to be found, does anyone have any suggestions on where it might have drifted off too. Or is it possible that my damsel ate it...lol

My first xenia actually melted to nothing!

 

[bighitrider45]

fishhead did it hapen in one night? or if it did get sucked into the powerhead how do i know?

 

[Fishead77]

fishhead did it hapen in one night? or if it did get sucked into the powerhead how do i know?

No, it took about a week. Smaller and smaller each day. I just got another small piece and it is doing very well. They are sensitive to alkalinity. Good luck.

 

[Damsel13]

ah now there is something I didn't know. xenia could be sensitive to alkalinity. How sensitive?

 

[Fishead77]

ah now there is something I didn't know. xenia could be sensitive to alkalinity. How sensitive?

According to the LFS pretty darn sensitive. My 1st try at xenia was last year when my parameters were not very stable. My tank is now established and the parameters are much more stable. I've noticed that if my alk. dkh drops below 8 (suggested norm) the xenia starts to recede. 8 or above, seems happy. I'm sure you could get your alk too high but I haven't had that problem. For me a kalk drip has been a huge part of stabilizing my parameters. That and time.

 

[Damsel13]

Very interesting. Thank you for the answer. I have some really nice xenia now, just a small stem (wish i had a pic.) well anyway it is pink pompom pulsating and I have a hard time keeping my pH! up. KH is good tho.
I was confusing the two.
What would cause low alk?


Debbie

 

[Fishead77]

Very interesting. Thank you for the answer. I have some really nice xenia now, just a small stem (wish i had a pic.) well anyway it is pink pompom pulsating and I have a hard time keeping my pH! up. KH is good tho.
I was confusing the two.
What would cause low alk?


Debbie

I don't test ph. I test alkalinity, calcium and magnesium. My philosophy is keep it simple stupid (me being the stupid). I'm not sure what makes the alk. drop down low. I use buffer to bring it up and kalk drip to keep it stable. When it gets out of wack I add the buffer. The key is not to have swings back and forth but a constant. The kalk drip helps achieve that.

 

[roblou]

yea and if it did get sucked in ur powerhead, you might see like huindreds of new xenia in a month or so. so beware.

This statement is SO true. I thought I lost all my xenia during the week long power outage in Dec. But now, I have xenia colonies popping up all over the place.

A lot like GSP, Xenia kind of end up being an out of control weed it seems....

 

[Damsel13]

K.......I am so into the keep it simple philosphy ( as I can't even find the spell checker)
The stuff I introduce into my tank if I am not careful is BAD. So I keep it simple.

Thanks for answering. What kind of xenia did ya have? i mean what did it look like?

 

[sc18702]

Iodine, Iodine, Iodine. I couldn"t get xenia to grow in my tank. It typically lasted for 1-2 weeks and then melted. I read here about using iodine for xenia. Bought a test kit and realized it was only running around .01. Slowly doesed over a week and brought it close to .06. In a matter of days it is thriving. Already sprouting new stalks.

I also read the addition of iodine only lasts 6-12 hours. Any truth to that ? Coincidentally, my sailfin tang has not been seen in days. Could he have been stressed as a result of the iodine ?

 

[Damsel13]

Sailfin Tang seems like it would be hard to miss....sorry to hear of your loss.

 

[sc18702]

I had also been feeding less to try and control nitrates, not sure if that contributed but he looked fine the last time I saw him. Maybe a sting from the anemone ? I'll likely never know.

 

[scytale]

Iodine, Iodine, Iodine. I couldn"t get xenia to grow in my tank. It typically lasted for 1-2 weeks and then melted. I read here about using iodine for xenia. Bought a test kit and realized it was only running around .01. Slowly doesed over a week and brought it close to .06. In a matter of days it is thriving. Already sprouting new stalks.

I also read the addition of iodine only lasts 6-12 hours. Any truth to that ? Coincidentally, my sailfin tang has not been seen in days. Could he have been stressed as a result of the iodine ?

Be careful with "iodine tests"---"iodine" is present in many forms in seawater (and can rapidly change chemical phases)
Commerical test kits will not detect these changes--as a result you can overdose!

Here's is an excerpt from 1 of the articles linked below:

"What About Dosing?

I would strongly advise people to not try to maintain 0.06 ppm iodine using supplementation and a test kit.

Why you ask? Isn’t that what we do for most other chemicals of interest? Well, if we could easily and accurately determine the concentrations of the different forms of iodine in aquaria, then I would recommend doing just that. However, if you combine the complexities of having multiple iodine species present with the uncertainty of having hobbyists use very complex test kits that may readily yield incorrect or difficult to interpret results, the stage is set for people driving their total iodine to levels far from what they actually intended. I do not know what levels of iodide or iodate become apparently problematic to real aquaria, but the risk of overdosing in this fashion is not insignificant. Both of the ICP studies reported above found some tanks with substantially elevated total iodine levels. I have no way of knowing how those levels got there, but overdosing of a supplement is one likely way. "

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/mar2003/chem.htm