Help ID bee TBS LR corals and critters?

[JoJosReef]

Hi all,
Awesome shipment of Tampa Bay Saltwater live rock last Thursday. FTS below:

Anyone able to ID these corals:
A

B

C

Then these fun looking things:
D (the black stuff)

E (clear stringy thing next to the Astrea)

F (good guy or Aiptasia?)

G (red/purple with some gold spots)

H (gorilla crab?)

I (white crab)

J (black feather duster?)

K

L (hermit crab, any idea what kind?)

M (I think this is a bad guy)

N (some type of flat worm and a peanut worm?)

O (regular ole' brittle star?)

Thanks for the help! Hope it was fun! Great fun for me!

 

[Sharlow]

I didn't know TBS was already back to shipping rock! That is wonderful. Did you go with the package? And is this your first shipment?

I'll jump in with what I can.

a-c. I*believe* those are Starlet coral. I have a few from LR in my tank. After three years they've grown a bit, but not much. They're a PS SPS
d. Sponge, most likely Chickenliver sponge
e. more Sponge
f. AFAIK TBS and the gulf doens't have Aiptasia, but they do have Curlyques, which look very similar. The third picture is a Feather duster. If you look above and to the left, you'll see two little tubes of a Gulf Vermitid snail. These are also unlike your normal reef snails, in that they won't really breed out and tank over, they justfeed off the water column at night.
g. Can't see the purple spot, only several feather dusters
h. Gorilla
i. Looks like a baby Anemone Porcelain crab
j. Horseshoe featherduster. Possibly a mollusk under that snail as well
k. possible Dwarf Cerith,I'd need to see under it.
l. Long Wrist hermit. They're derpy and get fairly large, but they're good guys. Prefer to hand out on the sandbed, and run faster then any other hermits I've ever kept.
m. Parasitic Isopod. If you have one, there are most likely more. Make sure to remove them all before you get fish in the tank. If you sneak out to the tank a couple hours after lights out, it's easier to find them swimming about.
n. The white ones floating in the water? They're Lancelets. They come in the sand, and will die off after a couple days.
o. Serpent star. Great guys

 

[sfin52]

The black stuf is black sponge.

 

[JoJosReef]

I didn't know TBS was already back to shipping rock! That is wonderful. Did you go with the package? And is this your first shipment?

I'll jump in with what I can.

a-c. I*believe* those are Starlet coral. I have a few from LR in my tank. After three years they've grown a bit, but not much. They're a PS SPS
d. Sponge, most likely Chickenliver sponge
e. more Sponge
f. AFAIK TBS and the gulf doens't have Aiptasia, but they do have Curlyques, which look very similar. The third picture is a Feather duster. If you look above and to the left, you'll see two little tubes of a Gulf Vermitid snail. These are also unlike your normal reef snails, in that they won't really breed out and tank over, they justfeed off the water column at night.
g. Can't see the purple spot, only several feather dusters
h. Gorilla
i. Looks like a baby Anemone Porcelain crab
j. Horseshoe featherduster. Possibly a mollusk under that snail as well
k. possible Dwarf Cerith,I'd need to see under it.
l. Long Wrist hermit. They're derpy and get fairly large, but they're good guys. Prefer to hand out on the sandbed, and run faster then any other hermits I've ever kept.
m. Parasitic Isopod. If you have one, there are most likely more. Make sure to remove them all before you get fish in the tank. If you sneak out to the tank a couple hours after lights out, it's easier to find them swimming about.
n. The white ones floating in the water? They're Lancelets. They come in the sand, and will die off after a couple days.
o. Serpent star. Great guys

Yes! TBS is doing business, but by email. In the end, we didn't do "The Package", due to it being such a small nano (not cost efficient), but we worked up something similar and the plan is just to do 20% daily water changes to keep everything happy and safe--about a week or so. All premium nano rock.

I love it. Definitely going back if I do another tank. Haha, "if".

 

[JoJosReef]

Re: isopod, I only found the one while sifting through the sand, but the first scoop was the least inspected. I did a more thorough inspection after noticing what I think was one of the lancelet worms escape in the DT. How long do the isopods live without fish to parasitize?

My biggest concern right now is the little white crab. If it is a baby porcelain, I understand it's not so bad. It got away in the DT of my home tank.

Are curlyques reef safe or pests?

Thanks for all of the IDs!

 

[JoJosReef]

How could I forget! See the hitchhiker below that went into the DT and disappeared. Tiny pistol shrimp?

Also, better pictures of the rocks with what I presumed were various sponges (and last one coral). Can you believe how awsome these rocks are?

 

[Sharlow]

Re: isopod, I only found the one while sifting through the sand, but the first scoop was the least inspected. I did a more thorough inspection after noticing what I think was one of the lancelet worms escape in the DT. How long do the isopods live without fish to parasitize?

My biggest concern right now is the little white crab. If it is a baby porcelain, I understand it's not so bad. It got away in the DT of my home tank.

Are curlyques reef safe or pests?

Thanks for all of the IDs!

Very cool! I've always wanted a TBS tank, and have considered driving out there to pick up the rock myself (they're 4 hours away) but just haven't had the cash on hand to pull the trigger. Those pictures look amazing though. I'm surprised there isn't any macro algaes on them though. I'm seeing a lot of Barnacles, which sadly won't survive, and some of the sponges may also die off, it's always hit and miss with sponges.

I'm not sure about how long the isopods can live without fish, but you may be able to set up a trap to catch them.

Porcelains are completely reef safe. They're filter feeders, and won't bother anything. If you get an anemone, they'll even host them!

Richard has always said Curlyques are safe, and I don't know anyone who has had issues with them, but reefers will always assume it's an aiptasia.

Hard to tell from the picture, but pistols are super common with TBS rock, so I wouldn't be surprised.

 

[JoJosReef]

Very cool! I've always wanted a TBS tank, and have considered driving out there to pick up the rock myself (they're 4 hours away) but just haven't had the cash on hand to pull the trigger. Those pictures look amazing though. I'm surprised there isn't any macro algaes on them though. I'm seeing a lot of Barnacles, which sadly won't survive, and some of the sponges may also die off, it's always hit and miss with sponges.

I'm not sure about how long the isopods can live without fish, but you may be able to set up a trap to catch them.

Porcelains are completely reef safe. They're filter feeders, and won't bother anything. If you get an anemone, they'll even host them!

Richard has always said Curlyques are safe, and I don't know anyone who has had issues with them, but reefers will always assume it's an aiptasia.

Hard to tell from the picture, but pistols are super common with TBS rock, so I wouldn't be surprised.

This recently active post has me terrified about the isopods:

Small creatures attached to clownfish

Saw one little creature attached to each of my clownfish in QT. Pulled the clowns out and the creatures fell right off into the net easily on their own. Any idea what they are? One is tan the other is black. My first reaction was flukes. Looks like a tiny body with two little eyes. Easily...

www.reef2reef.com

I'm going to try to set up a trap to find out if there are any in there... would be a horror show to find out there are hundreds in the rocks/sand...

 

[CrimsonTide]

Theres an active post about someone spending a couple weeks getting those isopods out of there tank with a trap. They also added a wrasse assume you can't with a nano tank so I would say trap is your best bet. Not sure those are the kind from that other post you mentioned but that post freaked me out as well.

 

[JoJosReef]

Theres an active post about someone spending a couple weeks getting those isopods out of there tank with a trap. They also added a wrasse assume you can't with a nano tank so I would say trap is your best bet. Not sure those are the kind from that other post you mentioned but that post freaked me out as well.

Exactly the post I was quoting above from @i_am_mclovin

Hope this doesn't turn into a nonstop pest control problem--was so happy with the results so far, and was hoping to get my tailspot blenny and firefish in a couple of weeks...

 

[CrimsonTide]

Exactly the post I was quoting above from @i_am_mclovin

Hope this doesn't turn into a nonstop pest control problem--was so happy with the results so far, and was hoping to get my tailspot blenny and firefish in a couple of weeks...

You can't have too many of them with such little Rock. I would try to trap some for the next couple of weeks then add your fish.

 

[i_am_mclovin]

Exactly the post I was quoting above from @i_am_mclovin

Hope this doesn't turn into a nonstop pest control problem--was so happy with the results so far, and was hoping to get my tailspot blenny and firefish in a couple of weeks...

Don’t freak out. At first I thought it was bad and I’d have to tear down my tank. They don’t only feed on fish so going fishless won’t help. But in all my searching I never found anyone who had them that had to tear down their tank. And I realized the eco system eventually takes care of them. It helps to trap early on with the “stinky water”.

It sounds like these are prevalent in ocean rock from the Atlantic. I got them from my LFS who buys their rock from the gulf. There’s a chance a few more were in my TBS rock but I can’t say for sure. I know my friend had them in his KP rock too. But it’s not a huge deal. Knock down numbers by catching them and before you know it it will be a non issue.

 

[Sharlow]

You can't have too many of them with such little Rock. I would try to trap some for the next couple of weeks then add your fish.

Don’t freak out. At first I thought it was bad and I’d have to tear down my tank. They don’t only feed on fish so going fishless won’t help. But in all my searching I never found anyone who had them that had to tear down their tank. And I realized the eco system eventually takes care of them. It helps to trap early on with the “stinky water”.

It sounds like these are prevalent in ocean rock from the Atlantic. I got them from my LFS who buys their rock from the gulf. There’s a chance a few more were in my TBS rock but I can’t say for sure. I know my friend had them in his KP rock too. But it’s not a huge deal. Knock down numbers by catching them and before you know it it will be a non issue.

I live on the Atlantic coast, a few hours from the harvest sites of a lot of the big LR distributors. Along the coast, I can pick up large barnacle husks and dead oyster shells and find a dozen of the little guys huddled together. Dudes are a menace out here.