uh oh kind of unexpected

[hops523]

Hey everyone, yesterday I went to the lfs to pick up more live rock. It is florida live rock. I bought four smaller pieces since I already had some fiji live rock. When I got home I put them in the tank. Well it turns out that all four of those pieces have coral on them. I didnt mean to get these because my tank was not fully cycled, but I did put this liquid stuff in the tank, its made by instant oceon, and it cycles the tank over night. My lfs told me it didnt really do it over night, but over a couple days. On two of the pieces there are small polypes, and if you look close there are little things sticking out of the rock and catches little particles that float by and go back in. Ther are really tiny, they almost remind me of little feather dusters, but 50 times smaller, does anyone know what it is? Another pieces has alot of polypes on there, they look like button polypes, but are alot smaller and stick to the rock more, and there are about 100 of those. And the last one was really confusing, because at the lfs it looked like a normal rock, so I got it. I got home and put it in the tank, a few hours later it started to look like a brain with little green with white tipped tentacles coming out! It was really surprising, does anyone know what they think this is

? Also would it be possible for florida coral to grow on fiji rock? They are on seperate sides of the tank, but I was just wondering.

 

[happyvac]

First of all, no chemical can shorten a cycle by that much. Sure, it may help, but the cycle's still gonna be more than a few days.
Sorry, but I don't think those corals are going to last.

 

[hops523]

The tank has been set up now for about a week and a couple of days. Yeah I dont think they will last either, but the coral with the tentacles, opened up when I brought it home, and it wasnt open in the tank at the lfs. Is that bad? Does anyone know what they are?

 

[granny]

I think its pretty cool that you got rock with corals and live stuff already open and on them-at live rock prices! Now, I am kind of an optimist and there is a possibility you may salvage these. polyps are tough, the tiny guys are feather duster worms. the others might just be ' fishing worms' which are common in live rock-cant tell without looking.
If you want to try and keep them-keep tabs on your water. You can keep the ammonia and nitrites down if you do frequent water changes. Yes, it slows down the ultimate cycling time, but just might let you salvage some of this neat stuff you just found.
After all, it has survived being sucked rom the ocean, bumped, bagged, shipped, dropped, dried, hosed off etc. It is pretty tough, though ammo and nitrites are killers!!
Good luck

 

[hops523]

Yeah I was very surprised. The feather duster worms will they grow? What do you mean tabs on my water? Oh yes I have been doing water changes very often. Yes, that is true I find it amazing that all of these fish in the lfs, and all the coral and anemones survive all of that.

 

[granny]

tabs-tabulations-monitor your levels of ammonia and nitrite closely. info tells us that anything but 0 ammo and 0 nitrites are deadly, but I have found that not to be true-minute quantities of either are tolerated by many tough corals and fish as well-we dont want to encourage placing anything live into a tank with measurable levels, but if it happens inadverdantly-as yours did-then we can often save the livestock. I have had many critters live through cycling of live rock-the original liverock inhabitants-
the small feather duster worms can grow, but usually they get eaten by some tank inhabitant and dont get the chance. If they survive your cycling and you have NO livestock in there-which is unlikely-they could grow large-There are also some worms that stay small, but you probably are seeing small feather dusters ad they are pretty common on live rock.

 

[hops523]

Oh ok I see. I really hope they do survive the cycling. Also do you know what the brain looking coral with green tentacles could be?
Also should I get any supplements to feed them?
Thank you

 

[granny]

Got to go to church so this is my last post of the day.
It could very well be a live remnant of a brain coral-cant tell anything really without pictures. Check some of the coral posts with pics and see ifyou can find something that looks like it. Plates also put our similar tentacles to feed.
HMM?? I dontk now about adding food now-it adds to your bioload, but I guess you could try and spot feed just the items you see-dont put anything into the water.
chop up some tiny shrimp with zoe or even some thawed mysis ifyou have it-but just the tiniest little bit and only once every couple of days at this time.
signing off-see you tomorrow-keep me posted
Granny

 

[hops523]

They are all doing fine so far, the brain or what I think is a brain is opend up and a great color. Everything else is doing good too.