Help with My Flame Scallop

indaword

New Member
I bought a Flame Scallop about a week ago...he has moved twice since I got him looking for a nice place to plant his foot. Now he is not looking so good. The long "fingers" that come out of him are so small and he is hanging down from his foot, not tucked tight in with the rocks like he was before. I was reading other posts and none of my fish or shrimp are going near him so I am hoping he his not dead. Does anyone have any suggestions as to what I can do to keep him healthy and alive since I notice that this site says their care level is difficult? Thanks!
 

ctgretzky9

Member
Originally Posted by indaword
I bought a Flame Scallop about a week ago...he has moved twice since I got him looking for a nice place to plant his foot. Now he is not looking so good. The long "fingers" that come out of him are so small and he is hanging down from his foot, not tucked tight in with the rocks like he was before. I was reading other posts and none of my fish or shrimp are going near him so I am hoping he his not dead. Does anyone have any suggestions as to what I can do to keep him healthy and alive since I notice that this site says their care level is difficult? Thanks!

Have you checked during the night? I am not sure if they close up at night etc...and really, dont know much about them, but at night, there is a lot of life in the tank they may harm it when you arent watching...shrimp, bristle worms, crabs etc....
Also, please post all of your parametrs. It makes it much easier to diagnose any problems you may overlook.
 

nm reef

Active Member
I've seldom heard of them thriving long term.....below is part of a well prepared article by Rob Toonen ...the full text can be found at one of the popular on-line monthly magazines...
"I wanted to make a point of emphasizing that the survival record of flame scallops in captivity has traditionally been extremely poor. The typical experience of people who buy them is that the animal tries its best at hiding (often with the aquarist having to pick it out of the rockwork numerous times so that it is visible in the aquarium) for a while before eventually giving up and slowly dying. Even when the rest of the reef tank is flourishing, people who add a flame scallop to their tank typically watch as it slowly wastes away over a period as short as a couple of months to a maximum of about six to ten months. I would guess that the single most common cause for the demise of flame scallops in any aquarium is quite simply starvation. Although I should also point out right off the bat that these animals are relatively short-lived (something on the order of about three to four years maximum, and I’ll come back to this later), there are still precious few reports of these animals surviving in captivity for more than a year or so. Sadly, the 6-10 months that most people manage to keep a flame scallop in their tank is also a reasonable estimate of how long it should take a well-fed animal to starve to death after collection and being placed in an aquarium in which it is deprived of food. So, if you’re really set on trying to add one of these attractive and interesting animals to your tank, you need to make a serious effort to provide it with the appropriate conditions to keep it healthy and well-fed in captivity. Hopefully, by the end of this article you will have some idea of how best to go about providing for the needs of these beautiful animals, and I hope that we may start seeing some more reports of long-term success with keeping them in captivity"
 

nm reef

Active Member
Here is another quote from Rob Toonen's article that touchs on their diet requirements....
"In terms of their lifestyle, flame scallops are specialist filter feeders that quite simply require a lot of planktonic food of the correct particle size. Unlike the more popular and expensive giant clams (members of the genus Tridacna), flame and flashing scallops lack any photosynthetic symbionts to help out with providing nutrition to the animal. The brilliant red color of the tissue and long tentacles of these animals is due instead to an unusually high concentration of caroteinods in their tissues (Lin and Pompa 1977) . Without the aid of photosynthetic symbionts from which to draw some nutritional support, flame scallops must rely solely on their ability to filter tiny particles from the water passing over them in order to support themselves. However, these animals do not simply filter any passing particles. They must also be of the correct size and flavor for the flame scallops to collect and ingest the particles."
 

clown52

Member
For the record; I had one and he lasted about 5 months. I will not be getting another. It's a shame too because I love the way they look.
 

piscian

Member
So what should you feed it? Will DT's be ok or will it require something else. I would like to know because I have one being deliver to me tomorrow. I'd like to keep it alive for at least its usual life expectancy. I would hate to think that I starved the poor thing to death!
 

indaword

New Member
Thanks... Ammo - 0, PH 8.2, trates 0, trites 0, temp 79
Thanks NM for the info...i will look for the full article. Hopefully my scallop can be a success story! Any idea what i can feed him??
 

pclown

Member
I would like to have one but I want to know on how to keep it alive too, so here is a bump.
 

maxalmon

Active Member
From what I have read and much thanks to NM for the informative posting above, why put an animal thru a slow starvation? I can see experts trying to keep a flame alive who have the technical experience of many years. I see no reason to keep this animal and will never purchase one simply because it's "pretty", in the back of my mind I would always know it's starving, cruel...
I'm getting ready to start adding fish to my reef and I'm doing a lot of research on each animal, I think others should do the same before making a hasty purchase IMO..
 

piscian

Member
I just read an article that said that they will accept Zoo and Photoplanktin, however they get their main source of nutrition from invertibrate larva. So, if you can find a way of getting a good source of that, then they will probably be ok. Also, they shouldn't be moved around just so you can see them better.
 

angelspot

Member
I've had my scallop for 9 months now with no problem and he stays out front. I feed my tank micro vert and he might it baby shrimp because I have alot of peppermint shrimp and two cleaner shimp that is always giving birth.
 

alyssia

Active Member
Originally Posted by maxalmon
From what I have read and much thanks to NM for the informative posting above, why put an animal thru a slow starvation? I can see experts trying to keep a flame alive who have the technical experience of many years. I see no reason to keep this animal and will never purchase one simply because it's "pretty", in the back of my mind I would always know it's starving, cruel...
I'm getting ready to start adding fish to my reef and I'm doing a lot of research on each animal, I think others should do the same before making a hasty purchase IMO..

Ditto
 
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