What not to own...

[Pedro Nuno Ferreira]

Hi ;-)

One of the animals a most recommend not to be kept at all are Paracucumaria and Pseudocolochirus mostly known by the common name of Sea Apples...and like the red (poisoned) apple given by the witch to snow white, these animals can release extremely powerful toxins (Holothurin and Holotoxin) that simply kill every thing living in the tank! One person that went through such a devastating experience, is a friend of mine that you can see collecting natural sea water in this thread Natural Sea Water (

1 2 3 ... Last Page). He knew about the risk but assumed if it happened he would have enough time to control the situation...well despite our warnings he decided to keep the sea apple and he found out that he could not control it and witnessed the entire crash of his tank and loss of all animals in about 30 minutes from start until total collapse. He used activated carbon, water changes...nothing worked. Nowadays he keeps a successful tank and produces nice coral frags every now and then, but it took a while for him to recover confidence and start all over again.
So please do not keep sea apples, even if you have a very, very large tank.

Pseudocolochirus

Paracucumaria

Here you can read about some more animals that should be avoided Reef venomous-dangerous critters and Paracucumaria/Pseudocolochirus will be included in due time as I continue the thread.

Cheers
Pedro Nuno ;-)

 

[KathyC]

the only linkia I have seen people have success with is the linkia mulitflora.

More about these. I wonder how many people who bought these still have them? In the correctly sized established tank, no problem, but in a small tank..not so good.

Dean originally posted this on this thread:
http://www.manhattanreefs.com/forum/aquatic-express/39386-multiflora-linckia.html

Sea Stars

Excerpt: Because Linckia stars appear to derive the vast majority of their nutrition from surface films, and are known for actively rejecting attempts to feed them, they are unlikely to do well in a tank that is recently, (within 6 months) set up, or one in which there is not enough live rock for them to continually find new surface films from which to graze. Therefore, they are not really recommended for reef tanks smaller than about 50 gallons or so for the long-term. Although small stars may do well in smaller tanks for some time, they will eventually require more space. The problem is that in such small tanks, even if the star is successfully acclimated (I’ll come back to this important detail in a moment), a reasonably-sized sea star (say about the size of your hand) will not have enough well-aged rock surface to continue to find food for extended periods of time. Another important consideration for tanks smaller than about 50 gallons is that Linckia laevigata can get quite large (30 cm or more across) and the amount of food they require will increase with their size -- obviously, the amount of established live rock in your tank will have to be quite large to support a grazing star which is about a foot in diameter!!

 

[pnoyreefer]

Glue and Plugs

 

[Solace Aquatics LLC]

I know it has already been said, but LINKIA stars are a major no no.

Moorish Idols - but has been done with success - ask Moidol

Mandarins - can be kept with great ease with the proper setup or taking frozen

All the animals discussed may or may not be able to be kept, but the best thing we can do as responsible reefers is HEAVILY research any animal we think we would like to add to our system. I have had toooooo many customers that ask "why is .... dying," sometimes my only reply is, "it should not have been taken out of our earth's ocean's to begin with." Research Research Research....

 

[MO~IDOL]

Moorish Idols - but has been done with success - ask Moidol

no Leo I tried a few no sucess...still my fav fish tho!
who ever want to keep these beauty go check out the reef magazine
http://www.manhattanreefs.com/magazine

 

[daaznmofo]

i wouldn't get any shrimp other than a sexi shrimp.
all the others make my zoos close and still food when i'm target feeding.
and they're a pain to catch.

 

[Awibrandy]

I know my case might not be the average case, but I've had one since the Spring swap last year and it's still alive and well, as far as i can tell. The tanks only a 40g breeder and it seems to be getting whatever it needs. It's bigger than when i got it as well.

DITTO

My sandsifting starfish has been in my tank 2 years now.

And for the no no list: spiny box puffer.

 

[ZBT3091]

i agree with justin. I had two cleaner shrimp and it was impossible to feed my corals. I sold them both.

 

[Awibrandy]

i agree with justin. I had two cleaner shrimp and it was impossible to feed my corals. I sold them both.

I just over feed and all are happy!:tongue1:

 

[bartur]

Feed shrimp first.

 

[DrCooper]

i wouldn't get any shrimp other than a sexi shrimp.
all the others make my zoos close and still food when i'm target feeding.
and they're a pain to catch.

Yea I found my cleaner shrimp stealing food from my dendros. Now I feed that fatso and then everyone else!

 

[daaznmofo]

i did feed the shrimp first. he kept wanting more.

 

[ellebelle]

Why no spiny box puffer? They can be collected locally and IME eat pellets readily. They get large, but in a large tank, what's the problem?

 

[ZBT3091]

I would feed my shrimp huge pieces of silversides that would keep him occupied for a long time, and he would still rip out the pieces of mysis from the corals and then throw it away just for the hell of it. i would stay away from them fo' sho'

 

[DaddyReefer13]

Just from personal experience and I know a lot of reefer have gone through this. . .

A smaller tank when you know that you can go bigger. Doing this will save you money, headaches and many, many explanations to your spouse as to why it makes sense for you to get a bigger tank.

I went from 30G long to 50G breeder and convinced my wife that we should go to a 90G set up :givebeer:

 

[D1J8Z]

why stop at 90 go bigger

 

[ellebelle]

Cleaner shrimp are fantastic. You can stop them from stealing food from your corals by placing the top of a water bottle around them and spray the food through the opening. Cleaner shrimp will sometimes help your fish out if they have a parasite like ich. IMO, they are worth the coral feeding trouble and shouldn't be on a hard and fast Do Not Own List.

I think it's important to make a distinction here between things that people truly cannot keep in aquaria (i.e. Sea Apples, Nudibranchs, some starfish) and things that people have had problems with for other reasons unrelated to suitability for captivity.

 

[DaddyReefer13]

why stop at 90 go bigger

I know what you mean . . a 120G is nice but at the point i'm worried about the weight especially since I'm on the 3rd floor of an old town house type home.

 

[Pinkheine]

Cleaner shrimp are fantastic. You can stop them from stealing food from your corals by placing the top of a water bottle around them and spray the food through the opening. Cleaner shrimp will sometimes help your fish out if they have a parasite like ich. IMO, they are worth the coral feeding trouble and shouldn't be on a hard and fast Do Not Own List.

I think it's important to make a distinction here between things that people truly cannot keep in aquaria (i.e. Sea Apples, Nudibranchs, some starfish) and things that people have had problems with for other reasons unrelated to suitability for captivity.

I very much agree with this. Our cleaner shrimp have been on the same rocks since we added them pretty much(they travel around the tank rarely). The fish all still go up and "park" for their daily cleaning. Reminds me of the Whalewash in Shark Tale. lol

I would like to add Cleaner Wrasse to the list of shouldn't own.

 

[lfsmarineguy]

Lissa is correct. I believe the original intent of this thread was to list all the livestock that should not be imported or housed in our tanks. The fact is that looking over this thread I see a lot of improper pairings or just general lack of research. Your tank is your responsibility. To say a store mislead you or gave you false information isn't the stores fault when there are web resources and forums like this all over the place. There is nobody on the face of this planet that can screw up your tank, but you.

The problem, and it's been said repeatedly, is that opinion is passed off as fact more often than it should be. To say that your sand sifting star died and wiped your tank and that is an indication that these creatures should never be imported is absurd. That is one instance and on top of that, there is no way to attribute the wiping of the tank to the starfish unless you ran extensive chemical analysis of your tank and the starfish and could point at a specific reaction or toxin derived from the starfish.

There are too many factors involved to just arbitrarily say that a species should never be imported because you couldn't keep it.

BTW, encrusting goniopora is easy to keep and can grow quickly given proper conditions as compared to their "free skeleton" cousins, sharks are easy to keep given the proper tank size and water conditions, angels eat sessile inverts or atleast nip at them, etc. Research is the least expensive additive you can use for your tank and not enough people take advantage.