gorgonia question

[saltank]

I have had a gorgonia for about 4-5 months, it is either a Plexaurella or Pseudoplexaura and has done quite well with nicely expanded polyps; however in the past month it has retracted for days at a time - is this normal?

Tank specs:
46gal bowfront
206Watt pc (110w + 96w) - added the 96w about 6 weeks ago slowly increasing the amount of time it is on
remora pro skimmer runs 24/7
1-2"ls,50lbs lr
3 fish- 2 damsels and 1 percula clown
all softies except 1 stony frag, all softies doing well except gsp which have also recently stayed retracted, the gsp retraction seemed in accordance with the additional light

feed the tank 1xday flakes and 1-2x week with brineshrimp plus or other meaty stuff

alk 2.9
calc 350
ph 8.4
nitrate <10
salinity 1.018

drip kalk for all topoff

tank seems to be doing great just curious about the behavior of the gorgonia which is very nice when expanded, sorry don't know how to post a pic

thanks for comments

 

[Anonymous]

My gorgonian does this occasionally, maybe once a week I will notice it does not have it's polyps out. I usually just assume that a fish brushed against it and startled it. Days at a time is kind of long, have you seen any of you damsels nipping at it?

I will say I think your salinity at 1.018 is a bit low, I keep mine at 1.025.

 

[saltank]

thanks for responding....you know I did notice the last few days before it closed up that it looked like something may have been bothering it, does anyone have experience with this?

 

[Nanogasm]

I have a gorgonia.. the purple whip variety. Occasionally my hermits like to climb the stalks and play bungee bend with it. It definately causes the polyps to retract, but they come back within the hour.

However, I have also seen my gorgonia go through phases like yours. For a day or two it has been mostly retracted. I always seem to think it is stressed in some way, but it keeps bouncing back so I seem to shrug it off. Mine is a wee bit close to a toadstool coral, so I'm wondering if there is some silent chemical warfare on the go. Is yours down current and nearby a softie?

 

[saltank]

It is down current but not close to any other corals. The only thing I can figure is something has bothered it. How long can it stay retracted and remain healthy? It definitely is one of the easy varieties to keep (photosynthetic) and according to THE REEF AQUARIUM vol 2 it is actually probably the easiest to care for.... I will keep you posted

Thanks

 

[Anonymous]

It can stay retracted for a couple days, even a week, and come back fine, although I usually take that as a sign that it is unhappy about something.

They do occasionally close up and then shed a skin, I see this way more often in my purple "whip" variety than my purple "plume" but the plume will do it too. (sorry, I can't remember their latin names offhand)

What you really want to be concerned about is algae growing on it, if you see that, then you have to act soon by increasing flow greatly. They can take a suprising amount of water movement.

 

[Sugar Magnolia]

My gorg does the same thing, the polyps will stay retracted for a day or two then reappear. I never really worried about it since it seems to do it on a regular basis, every few weeks or so.

 

[Anonymous]

Some do shred their out skin and if you look closely you'll see a 'sheen' or 'film' on the critter. You can gently waft water at it-like a turkey baster and knock loose the shed skin. I have both the sea whip type and the encrusting varieties, and they both go through those shed cycles. Since you've upgraded the lighting I also wouldn't count that out as a cause.

I would also raise the SG to more normal ranges as LauraD posted. Most fish can take the hyposalinity but inverts do poorly at lower SG levels.

 

[saltank]

thanks for the respones. it did start coming back out yesterday and I agree with the advice of raising the sg level which I am trying to do very slowly