Live rock hitch-hicker what is this slug creature

[nefretier]

I recently bought a live rock for my tank. To my surprise it had a dark critter on it. Please help me identify it and tell me it's care rules

 

[ying yang]

Some kind d of spiny cucumber maybe ?

 

[Kiboshed]

Some kind d of spiny cucumber maybe ?

See the podia? 100% sea cucumber.

I recently bought a live rock for my tank. To my surprise it had a dark critter on it. Please help me identify it and tell me it's care rules

How established is your tank? Most Sea Cucumbers are harmless sand sifters or filter feeders. Some can release toxins to defend themselves when stressed or threatened. No idea if that is one of them.

Real issue is if you don't have an established tank it will have no nutrients to sift from the sand and it will starve to death.

If your tank is new I would give it or trade it to your lps. Definitely a cool hitch-hiker.

 

[nefretier]

See the podia? 100% sea cucumber.

How established is your tank? Most Sea Cucumbers are harmless sand sifters or filter feeders. Some can release toxins to defend themselves when stressed or threatened. No idea if that is one of them.

Real issue is if you don't have an established tank it will have no nutrients to sift from the sand and it will starve to death.

If you tank is new I would give it or trade it to your lps. Definitely a cool hitch-hiker.

About 2-3 years now. We also have spaghetti worms living in the sand bed.

 

[bnord]

bet it will be fine then, expect never to see it again except under moonlight

 

[ISpeakForTheSeas]

Yeah, some kind of sea cucumber - possibly Holothuria sp. or Isostichopus badionotus, but I'm not certain. If either of these are correct, your cuke would be a bottom feeder/sand sifter - they eat pretty much anything they can find (they aren't predators of anything you'd care about in the tank) and aren't particularly picky, but they do need a lot of food typically. They'll eat microfauna (pods, rots, etc.) and microflora (microalgae and pieces of macroalgae), detritus, leftover flake foods, etc. - they'll eat pretty much anything that reaches the floor and is small enough.

As mentioned, many sea cucumbers will release toxins when stressed/dying, so it's important to keep them happy and to be prepared to deal with that situation should it arise (i.e. be prepared to do an emergency water change, add carbon, transfer livestock to a hospital tank, etc.) - some cukes are highly toxic, some only mildly, some release toxin when stressed, others only release it once their corpse starts to decay, etc. so the risk varies a lot depending on the species, but unless they're one of the highly toxic species (like Sea Apples) it's not usually too big of a concern. Plus, many species will give warnings that they're dying/stressed, so sometimes people are able to get a heads up that they need to remove them (see my quote below for more info).

Some sea cucumbers like to just pick a spot and stay there, so it might just decide not to move. Given that you said this one started real small and kept growing, it's possible you just had all three come in at the same time, possibly from the same batch of baby sea cucumbers. If that's the case you either could have just missed them because they were so small, or the other two may have just moved over there because the conditions there are more favorable for their larger size than the previous area they were in.

Regardless, most sea cucumbers are generally safe in reef tanks (not much tries to eat them, so generally you don't need to worry about them getting overly stressed), but you should probably make sure your equipment is sea cucumber safe (i.e. you want to make sure they can't get pureed by going into one of your powerheads or something), and - as was mentioned above - they can release toxins when they die, so you'll want to keep an eye out for that. A lot of sea cucumbers will give you some sort of warning before they die (such as contracting to look short and squat - a defense mechanism/sign of extreme distress that they use to try and escape predators/death - or ejecting a cloud of toxins - because of how this actually works, the cucumber generally dies after releasing the toxins), and some of them, as long as they don't get hyper distressed, (as I understand it) won't intentionally release toxins in your tank - they just die like a normal animal, so as long as you remove the body fast enough, it won't poison your tank.

On the off chance that they do decide to release toxins into your tank, if you catch it early enough, you can run carbon, do a big water change, and (if necessary) transfer your livestock to another tank. I would strongly recommend using protective equipment in this case as some sea cucumbers when they release toxins can be dangerous to humans, but, ideally you wouldn't need to worry about it. Ideally, you'd just remove the cucumber either soon before or soon after it dies (the people I've talked to said they didn't need to run carbon or anything when theirs died in their tank, so as long as you catch it before the body starts degrading you should pretty much be fine as I understand it).

Lots of scary info there, but generally sea cucumbers are safe to keep, and as long as they are physically safe from harm in your tank the chances of them "cuke nuking" it by releasing toxins into your tank are very slim.

Hope this helps!

TLDR; nem guards are good idea for sea cucumbers.

 

[ying yang]

Let's talk: Spiny Sea Cucumbers

image The Pink and Green Sea Cucumber is a colorful filter feeder for home reef aquariums over 30 gallons. Rows of pink knobby thorns run lengthwise along its green and yellow body. Like Sea Apples, striking yellow and pink tentacles extend during feeding. Unlike most other sea cucumbers this...

www.reef2reef.com

From this thread post 8 I noticed the tubular feet,( is this what you mean by podia) sorry not well versed on sea cucumbers,just looked like a spiny cucumber to me then noticed the feet in above thread and looked like a good match to me ^_^

See the podia? 100% sea cucumber.

 

[nefretier]

Yeah, some kind of sea cucumber - possibly Holothuria sp. or Isostichopus badionotus, but I'm not certain. If either of these are correct, your cuke would be a bottom feeder/sand sifter - they eat pretty much anything they can find (they aren't predators of anything you'd care about in the tank) and aren't particularly picky, but they do need a lot of food typically. They'll eat microfauna (pods, rots, etc.) and microflora (microalgae and pieces of macroalgae), detritus, leftover flake foods, etc. - they'll eat pretty much anything that reaches the floor and is small enough.

As mentioned, many sea cucumbers will release toxins when stressed/dying, so it's important to keep them happy and to be prepared to deal with that situation should it arise (i.e. be prepared to do an emergency water change, add carbon, transfer livestock to a hospital tank, etc.) - some cukes are highly toxic, some only mildly, some release toxin when stressed, others only release it once their corpse starts to decay, etc. so the risk varies a lot depending on the species, but unless they're one of the highly toxic species (like Sea Apples) it's not usually too big of a concern. Plus, many species will give warnings that they're dying/stressed, so sometimes people are able to get a heads up that they need to remove them (see my quote below for more info).

TLDR; nem guards are good idea for sea cucumbers.

 

[vetteguy53081]

may be a greenfish cucumber. Tigertail most common for reef . They sift the sand for detritus and uneaten food and in essence take food in and expel waste as they travel

 

[nefretier]

Yeah, some kind of sea cucumber - possibly Holothuria sp. or Isostichopus badionotus, but I'm not certain. If either of these are correct, your cuke would be a bottom feeder/sand sifter - they eat pretty much anything they can find (they aren't predators of anything you'd care about in the tank) and aren't particularly picky, but they do need a lot of food typically. They'll eat microfauna (pods, rots, etc.) and microflora (microalgae and pieces of macroalgae), detritus, leftover flake foods, etc. - they'll eat pretty much anything that reaches the floor and is small enough.

As mentioned, many sea cucumbers will release toxins when stressed/dying, so it's important to keep them happy and to be prepared to deal with that situation should it arise (i.e. be prepared to do an emergency water change, add carbon, transfer livestock to a hospital tank, etc.) - some cukes are highly toxic, some only mildly, some release toxin when stressed, others only release it once their corpse starts to decay, etc. so the risk varies a lot depending on the species, but unless they're one of the highly toxic species (like Sea Apples) it's not usually too big of a concern. Plus, many species will give warnings that they're dying/stressed, so sometimes people are able to get a heads up that they need to remove them (see my quote below for more info).

TLDR; nem guards are good idea for sea cucumbers.

Thank you, you shared a lot of important info I was completely unaware of. I definitely think our tank can provide food and safe housing once an anemone guard is added to the powerheads. I'm very invested in identifying it to know how concerned I should be about it "nuking" the tank.

 

[Kiboshed]

Thank you, you shared a lot of important info I was completely unaware of. I definitely think our tank can provide food and safe housing once an anemone guard is added to the powerheads. I'm very invested in identifying it to know how concerned I should be about it "nuking" the tank.

I would be too. Could be just a helpful little sand sausage OR could be the doom of your whole tank if it gets stressed.