Xenia

lightman

New Member
:help: I am having trouble getting xenias to live and grow. I have a 90gallon with power compacts and a wet dry and protein skimmer. Can anyone give me some advice so I dont keep donating my money to the fish store!!!!!!!
 

rbmount

Active Member
Mine are flourishing under 192 watts PC in a 46 bow. I take an eyedropper and feed baby brine mixed with phytoplankton once a week. I have them placed up near the top of my tank.
 

dana&pj

Member
Mine are doing well with high lighting now, but I had to add some iodine when I first brought them home to get them going. I used a time release form of iodine. It won't show up on a test so I add less and less now that they are happy.
 

skirrby

Active Member
hmm. mine are doing great under 260 watts of power compacts. and i dont feed them or dose iodine for them.. they are just there and loving it.. i cant imagine how much they are going to take off when i get my halides going
 

spinner

Member
Kip, that's a beautiful stand of xenia.
I've personally had mixed results with Xenia. It will do well for months at a time then slowly fade. And the xenia I've had in the past were frags from established, local tanks.
I'm workingt a theory on xenia. It may be incorrect , but until someone can convince me otherwise, I'll go with it.
Xenia often do well in water that is less than pristine. I have no idea why, and I'm no scientist, but for some reason, water with traces of nitrates often lead to healthy stands of xenia.
Water that is "too clean" seems to cause xenia not to spread rapidly.
I've got no evidence to back this up, and I could be way off base. I'd love to get more knowledge on the subject.
Spinner
 

ags

Member
IME xenia is hit or miss. I have never been able to successfully keep xenia in my tank despite success with LPS corals that have been in my tank for years (torch, frogspawn, hammers, trumpet, candy cane).
I admit to a constant learning curve in this hobby but have yet to figure out the mystery of the xenia. What frustrates me even more is my friend, who never maintains his tank, can't keep the stuff from spreading. :mad:
 

lightman

New Member
Thanks for all the responses. Niger12 I have 2 96watt 36inch PC's. Wet dry with a protein skimmer I will try to get a pic on there if I can find my digital camera.
 

lightman

New Member
Kip that xenia looks awesome I have not tried that type of xenia wich I thing is Red sea maybe I will try that type!!!!
 

suver569

Member
Lightman- Look into using IodiDe suppliments, rather than Iodine. I suppliment with about a teaspoon every 2-3 days, and mine are growing out of control. I first got them and they were good for about a week, then started shriveling up and what looked like, splitting on the stems. A friend told me to suppliment Iodide, and within 24 hours, they were opened back up and within about 3 days, completly healed up. They have since spread to almost twice the size they were when I first got them a month ago. HTH.
 

lightman

New Member
Thanks Suver I will try that. I am going tommorow to buy some new ones since my old ones vanished. What kind of xenia do you have?
 

suver569

Member
Red Sea Pom-Pom. The left side is partially closed because the lights were just on shortly, but you can see where it's spreading inbetween the stalks on the rock, and the stalk in the front was from growth. The original piece was the middle 2 on the top of the rock. The right side is also all growth within the last month.
 

lightman

New Member
Thanks for all the info!I purchased 2 types of xenia today and put them in. One was opened at first but has since closed. I bought some Chromaplex which they told me to add 3x a week so I will give it another shot. I will hopefully have some healthy xenia to talk about!!!!!!
 
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