Carribbean or African Blue Zoos

limestro · Oct 25, 2007

Looking for any one who has successfully kept these zoas for a significant period of time.

This is the fourth(or is it fifth) time that I have came across these type of zoas, however they seem very sensitive to change in chemistry, lighting and worst of all susceptible to fungus.

How long have you guys had a colony like these before? Anyone successful?

Here are some old picture that are similar to these RIP:

Any thing special that I should do to keep these colonies alive?

twon8 · Oct 25, 2007

i had about 40 polyps that withered away, but recently i saw that there are 2 or 3 polyps left over after months of thinking them for dead. the lfs here still has a frag left, they have kept them alive successfully.

jonbar1 · Oct 25, 2007

I've had my frag for about six months. They seem most susceptible to me when first added to the tank. After they are acclimated to your conditions after a couple days the only thing special I've noticed is they want high light. I keep mine in the brightest spot I have.

I've often wondered if they come from colder waters and the stress of being in warm water tropical aquariums is what makes them so vulnerable to problems.

limestro · Oct 25, 2007

jonbar1 said:
I've often wondered if they come from colder waters and the stress of being in warm water tropical aquariums is what makes them so vulnerable to problems.

I was curious about that too...but the colony i had (in the second picture) I was running 2x250w MH on a 60 gal with fans and an ATO. I ran a RK2 controller so I would have lights cut off around 82 degrees. The colony managed to survive California's heatwave that year so for all I know this case can be a stroke of luck? One thing that I know for sure is that they are very susceptible to fungus or what not.

These colonies are one of my favorite type of colonies but I've never been successful with them.

~Mike

fishes2889 · Oct 25, 2007

I have given up on most if not all caribbean morphs. They all do so well for so long with me and then out of the blue they get fungus and die.

msman825 · Oct 25, 2007

fishes2889 said:
I have given up on most if not all caribbean morphs. They all do so well for so long with me and then out of the blue they get fungus and die.

did you loss your colony that you sent me a frag of

Azurel · Oct 26, 2007

From the pic of the big rock are the ones your talking about like these?

dc_909 · Oct 26, 2007

Got these back in June

Here they are today after sitting in a holding tank for over a month

Azurel · Oct 26, 2007

I had those same ones and they are very temperamental just like all caribbean zoanthids.....They are so frustrating.

limestro · Oct 27, 2007

Azurel,

Yeah they look just like those. There is also another colony mixed in with those that has more of a full solid center. This is by far the largest colony I have had in possession of these types of zoas, but I have never had long term success. I've also noticed that these type of colonies tend to propagate slower and die at a faster rate.

***

DC_909,

Those look like it too. I need to get a better picture.

BTW, for the record. still owe both of you a trade =) I haven't forgotten. Just lagging.

~Mike

dc_909 · Oct 27, 2007

I had 4 frags of those when I got them, but this is the only survivor.

Azurel · Oct 27, 2007

No worries....I know how it is man.

As far as the blues I have them in really high flow that comes from my power filter and almost direct lighting about 6 inches from the water surface. The lights are 250w 14k Hamilton SE and 2x54w T-5 UVI Superactinics....They have quadrupled in size since I placed them there. It started out as 10-15 polyps and had grown to 50+. I have had some issues with them that seemed chemical in nature like parameters being out of whack....

fishes2889 · Oct 27, 2007

msman825 said:
did you loss your colony that you sent me a frag of

yup

fishes2889 · Oct 27, 2007

Azurel said:
From the pic of the big rock are the ones your talking about like these?

These are the only ones i have left...

detguy123 · Oct 27, 2007

i have kept a few morphs of carribbean blues but every time they either got fungus and died or just melted away..i gave up on them...i do have some more carribeans now they are not blue more of a green and have been doing very well better than any others i ever had..i got them up top with my sps and seem to really love the light here is a pic of the new ones i got

limestro · Oct 27, 2007

detguy123 said:
i have kept a few morphs of carribbean blues but every time they either got fungus and died or just melted away..i gave up on them...i do have some more carribeans now they are not blue more of a green and have been doing very well better than any others i ever had..i got them up top with my sps and seem to really love the light here is a pic of the new ones i got

I like the look of these. How hardy are these?

~Mike

fishes2889 · Oct 28, 2007

Those are the ones i had a HUGE colony of and they all died off.....put them in high light and high flow, its what i learned....i have a frag of 5 polyps left

limestro · Oct 28, 2007

fishes2889 said:
Those are the ones i had a HUGE colony of and they all died off.....put them in high light and high flow, its what i learned....i have a frag of 5 polyps left

Advice taken. I bought the colony with half of it already dying off. I knew that these guys would be a PITA since this is my 5th attempt on keeping them. I've been dipping it in Furan2 to prevent any more spread of the fungus and decided to scrap off all the dying polyp sto prevent any spread of more of the fungus. This off course was half of the colony =(. I know its optimistic, but I hope that battle is downhill from here. I swapped out my skimmer from a Eermuda Aquatics back to my Tunze 9010 just to be safe. Thanks for all your guys' advice, hopefully your colonies are doing fine. fishes2889, if you do loose your colony hopefully I will be somewhat successful in atleast trying to replenish your loss =).

~Mike

detguy123 · Oct 28, 2007

i have mine right at the top with my sps..directly under the halides with a good amount of flow and the are happy....i found out that these were collected in about 3 feet of water so i am sure they love the light..mine have been really good so far..but that is how my blues were and they just went away..here is a pic of them before i lost them

limestro · Oct 28, 2007

detguy123 said:
i have mine right at the top with my sps..directly under the halides with a good amount of flow and the are happy....i found out that these were collected in about 3 feet of water so i am sure they love the light..mine have been really good so far..but that is how my blues were and they just went away..here is a pic of them before i lost them

detguy123,

The zoas in the picture look disturbed or melting away, did it first start here when you took the pic or was it on its way out? BTW, do you have any close ups of the zoas on the left? =)

~Mike