Medusa Cucumber Reproduction

celacanthr

celacanthr

Active Member
About 3 months ago I bought a medusa "worm" (cucumber). It is from the carribean, and it seems to be eating the diatoms, or detritus, or a different algae, so I am thinking it may be Synaptula hydriformis. I based this flimsy ID on diet, location (carribean), and that the big medusa worm is probably carrying the babies internally, which is why they are surviving so easily. I can't be postive at all on the ID though, since it is usually impossible to ID, without cutting it up .
Well, it has grown MUCH larger, and a few weeks ago I was looking around the tank, and noticed that there were 20(+) smaller medusa worms.
Recently I have had another wave of small medusa cucumbers. The other generation has gotten much larger, and it seems all of them survived. :cheer:
The thing that worries me the most is that I may not be able to reproduce this phenomenon again.

So I wanna hear y'alls opinions on this.
CELA :happyfish
 
celacanthr

celacanthr

Active Member
Yeah, I think it is pretty cool, considering I didn't even do anything,

but now i am worried that when I move the cuc's to the new tank, adn put a protien skimmer on this tank, that I won't be able to get them to reproduce again.

 
ophiura

ophiura

Active Member
Can you get a picture??
This is very cool to hear

But I must warn you, more talk like this and I will assume you intend to be an echinoderm biologist and will turn you over to the echinoderm authorities for proper "education" in our ways. ;)
I assume that if you touch it, it feels sticky as well?
Based on the overall abundance of that particular species I would say you are probably correct in the ID.
 
celacanthr

celacanthr

Active Member
yes, I can get I picture, just a very bad one.

How did you know I wanted to be a echinoderm biologist!?
Yep sticky.

 
celacanthr

celacanthr

Active Member
I have been thinking lately about what may have caused them to spawn. I do not have a heater, so I was thinking that maybe they spawn seasonally.
Ophiura-do you know if many holothuroids, or echinoderms for that matter, reproduce according to the season?
The only other thing I could think of is that it has plenty of food, but surely at least one other person who has this species has plenty of food for it in their tank.
 
celacanthr

celacanthr

Active Member
Well, they have been growing. The babies stay right at the top of the sand, and stick their heads out. The smaller ones seems to stay in the thick "meadows" of filamentous algae. The slightly larger ones will stay in the meadow of Caulerpa prolifera, but usually deep down where they are hard to find. The largest ones stay in the dark caves in the LR. I think that they find the most secure areas that can fit into. Apparently none have died (at least not of being chopped up by the pump impeller(sp?)), because neither of my fish have asphyxiated.
I haven't seen any new ones recently which makes me think that the spawning was sparked by the change in temperature. Any other theories on why they spawned?
-CELA
 
ophiura

ophiura

Active Member
Extremely cool! And I think that your assessment of the temperature may be a good one. Many animals rely on environmental cues that they no longer receive in our ultra-stable tanks...whether tides, temperature, lighting, etc.
 
cirolanidh

cirolanidh

New Member
Hey,
This is very neat to hear! I am actually working on a project that will start documenting reproduction of invertebrates in aquariums. This sounds like an excellent candidate for captive breeding. If you are interested, please let me know and we can chat over email.
I am a bit concerned about the toxicity though. CELACANTHr and Ophiura, do you know if these would be toxic or is that just a myth or reefing "urban legend".
Brian
 
ophiura

ophiura

Active Member
Well, to some degree I would say there is toxicity...but the extent is probably urban legend. The real problem are sea apples, IMO. Not so much these but I am not an expert in these guys. I know that Toonen also wrote an excellent article on them out there in googleworld.
As he is coming to MACNA as well....
I do have a lot of sources in the holothuroid world, and can try to get some more information from them as well, assuming we could get an ID on some of these (and I know people to do that though it would require a sacrifice of some beasts).
 
celacanthr

celacanthr

Active Member
Originally Posted by ophiura
Extremely cool! And I think that your assessment of the temperature may be a good one. Many animals rely on environmental cues that they no longer receive in our ultra-stable tanks...whether tides, temperature, lighting, etc.
Cool! I think it may have been that also. Maybe I could settup another small tank, and slowly raise the temp, and see if anything happens. I would just need to figure out what EXACTLY they eat, and how to grow it, and I think their diet varies vastly from species to species, so I would probably need a positive ID.
 
celacanthr

celacanthr

Active Member
Originally Posted by CirolanidH
Hey,
This is very neat to hear! I am actually working on a project that will start documenting reproduction of invertebrates in aquariums. This sounds like an excellent candidate for captive breeding. If you are interested, please let me know and we can chat over email.
I am a bit concerned about the toxicity though. CELACANTHr and Ophiura, do you know if these would be toxic or is that just a myth or reefing "urban legend".
Brian
Sure that's fine! Just shoot me an e-mail
ndnlittlecrow@<remove>gmail.com
As for the toxicity. I don't know if they are as poisonous as some say. In the article that Ophiura is talking about Toonen uses the example of one of these critters getting chopped up by a powerhead, to be enough to make them release their toxins, but I have found even soem of the smallest of them playing around on the grating of my 690GPH powerhead, without getting sucked in. So I think that is unlikely that one would even be sucked into a powerhead.
Or if they have been sucked into my powerhead then their toxin may not be strong at all, if they even released it that is.
 
celacanthr

celacanthr

Active Member
Originally Posted by ophiura
Well, to some degree I would say there is toxicity...but the extent is probably urban legend. The real problem are sea apples, IMO. Not so much these but I am not an expert in these guys. I know that Toonen also wrote an excellent article on them out there in googleworld.
As he is coming to MACNA as well....
I do have a lot of sources in the holothuroid world, and can try to get some more information from them as well, assuming we could get an ID on some of these (and I know people to do that though it would require a sacrifice of some beasts).
I have plenty. How many and how big would they have to be to get a positive ID?
 
celacanthr

celacanthr

Active Member
Originally Posted by ophiura
First step is can you get some pictures?
Unfortunately the best I can get are the ones up there^^^^
 
celacanthr

celacanthr

Active Member
Well this morning I was looking in my tank, and found a VERY tiny one, probably the tiniest I have seen. So, if I just noticed this one, then that could mean that different ones develop at much different rates, or that the spawning season continues into summer, or that they develop much slower than I thought originally, and this may have been a brood from earlier, which means I have another bunch of them out there somewhere. I am guessing it would help to know the brood size of these critters. :sigh:
-CELA
 
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