Not much to say this month, so let's get to it.
John Canada of Great Plains Seahorses has written an article for Fish & Chips which should be of interest to any of you with tanks suffering from parasite problems. His article, A Website Intro and Stop Parasites Offer, speaks highly of the Chem-Marin product from both the perspective of the hobbyist and businessman. Over the course of working with John on this article, he and I have become friends. John's a nice man - hobbyist first, honest businessman second. A rare find in my opinion. Do him, and me, the honor of considering his offer, considering his site for your purchases of Chem-Marin products, and stop by his site now and then and watch it's growth.
Before I let you go, I'd like to extend a very special thank you to Don Higgins for the donation of the book Ocean Realm Guide To Reef Creatures Marine Invertebrates (Text and Photography by Paul Humann, First Printing 1982, Ocean Realm Publishing Corporation). It's an older book, but no less useful. Don's donation came perfectly timed as the book contained information on the Sea Pen, this month's Critter. Thanks bunches.
General Information:
General Information:
According to The Reef Aquarium Volume Two, Sea Pens represent the highest order of
octocoral
based on their "...colonial complexity, polymorphism
of polyps, functional specialization of polyps and colonial integration." The Reef Aquarium labels
them "super organisms" since their various polyp types perform different functions (circulation
and respiration, feeding and digestion, sexual reproduction, and locomotion).
The Sea Pen is quite unique. The structural support is actually a large primary polyp which forms a muscular peduncle (like the column and foot of an anemone), which buries and anchors the coral in the substrate without the use of stolons or filaments. The upper part of this primary polyp, the rachis, supports branches of secondary polyps. The secondary polyps are dimorphic and in the case of the Cavernularia Sea Pen are arranged around the entire length of the primary polyp. Sclerites are usually smooth needles or angular plates.
The rachis of a Cavernularia Sea Pen, considered a more primitive genera, is a rounded club-shaped cylinder with polyps on all sides. Cavernularia Sea Pens are usually brown or light tan with white tipped polyps. The more advanced genera gives the appearance of a feather quill, hence the name Sea Pen. I was unable to obtain a picture of a Cavernularia, but the image I did obtain clearly shows the quill-like Sea Pen mentioned above. Color varies greatly among the different species of Sea Pens but oranges and bluish-whites are most common for the quill-like ones.
Their natural habitat are the sandy bottoms between reefs. According to The Reef Aquarium Volume Two, which contained specific information on the Cavernularia type Sea Pens, they are found in the Indo-Pacific region and imported from Indonesia and Singapore. According to Ocean Realm Guide To Reef Creatures Marine Invertebrates, which covered the more quill-like Sea Pens, they are found in colder waters (off the coast of Vancouver Island, Canada for example).
Scientific Name & Information:Home Aquaria:
Caring for this coral is easy if they are fed regularly, see Foods & Feeding below.
Sea Pens require a layer of substrate, usually fine sand or mud, at least three inches (7.6cm) deep.
Sea Pens are inflated by water drawn into the colony and some can deflate to a fraction of their size by forcing that water out. Touching one can cause this reaction.
Sea Pens vary in height from a few inches to a yard.
The following is according to the Reefkeeper's FAQ:
| Captive Difficulty (0=beginner 5=experienced 9=advanced) | 3 |
| Florescent Lighting (50% tri-color white + 50% actinic) (0=1.5 watts/gallon 5=4.5w/g 9=7.5w/g) | 3-8 |
| Distance From Florescent Lighting | >5 inches |
| Metal Halide Lighting (0=1w/g 5=3w/g 9=5w/g) | 1-3 |
| Distance From Metal Halide Lighting | >20 inches |
| Water Current Level (0=stagnant 5=medium 9=turbulent) | 2-5 |
| Hair Algae Compatibility (0=none 5=some algae 9=heavy algae) | 0 |
| Food Source | zooplankton (baby artemia) |
| Additives Required | Iodine, Calcium, and Strontium |
Also according to the Reefkeeper's FAQ, Sea Pens are not very compatible in reef tanks because of their half-sessile existence. I really didn't find any research to back this statement up. The only issue in keeping Sea Pens that I found in my research, was their feeding requirements.
Foods & Feeding:
Although Cavernularia Sea Pens have a brown coloring, there is no
zooxanthellae present. The polyps feed
on detritus, zooplankton, and possibly
(according to The Reef Aquarium Vol. Two)
phytoplankton.
You should offer your Sea Pen Artemia nauplii, Daphnia, pulverized flake food, and detritus stirred up from the bottom of the tank.
Reproduction:
Reproduction in the home aquaria has not been reported, either by sexual or asexual means.
Photo Credits:
The picture of the Sea Pen (filename seapensr.jpg) was obtained at the Simplified Reef Keeping
website (http://www.connix.com/~reefkeep/ (url dead 8/24/04)).
Simplified Reef Keeping is a book by Robert M. Metelsky.
Thanks go to Robert for granting permission to use the image in this article.
Great Plains Seahorses at http://www.seaponies.com
(information updated 4/19/00: GPS closed).
I'm here at Fish & Chips to introduce myself, my site, tell you a little bit about some products I sell and believe in, and make you an offer.
Rose Ann Canada, my wife, is the owner of this business which was started in February 1999. Yeah, we are new, but we are dedicated! Being medically retired, I find this hobby to be a fun way to spend my day. Both of us love exotic animals and keep a Cockatoo besides our fish. As for fish, it was 28 years ago when I got my first Seahorse Aquarium and I was hooked. When Rose Ann and I got married, we soon set up two 30 gallon tanks which have since become 13. What fun and what work!
Great Plains Seahorses is a small and simple site and we like it that way. We do have great plans for it though and our little, growing, business. Before I move on to those products I mentioned and that offer I hinted at, let me tell you about our future plans for the Great Plains Seahorses website. We have just made arrangements to sell live seahorses. This is so new that we haven't even had time to update our website yet! We are very excited, it's why we started this whole thing to begin with. We plan to add a discussion room for Seahorses and fish, and jewelry made from Seahorses. For you conservationists out there, the Seahorses will have died a natural death. There will be no killed Seahorses used for this purpose. We also intend on offering a wall hanging that will be Seahorse orientated.
I am selling a treatment for ICH that is safe for everything in the tank - invertebrates, corals, and live rock. The way I came across Stop Parasites is that I had been battling parasites for about 3 months. I tried everything. I tried copper and had a dead tank and lost three fish. I tried the copper-less stuff that turned the water blue and I still had the parasites. I was about to give up. Then I read an article in Freshwater And Marine Aquarium magazine. In this issue there was a write up about Stop Parasites that got my attention. It is easy. Just disconnect mechanical filtration and go for it. You can even leave the protein skimmer on.
I then did a 5 day treatment with the Stop Parasites and the parasites were gone. It was a trip watching the parasites grow bigger and bigger till there were no more. When I found out they were looking for distributors, I jumped on the band wagon.
There are two other products that Chem-Marin makes. F.W.P. which stands for Fresh Water Parasites. Even though Stop Parasites is safe for fresh water if used at half strength, F.W.P. is specifically formulated for fresh water. The only difference is Stop Parasites will kill the parasites where F.W.P. will cause the parasites to slough off and starve. I have one customer that uses it in her foot soaking solution. She says that it really helps. I am not advocating using this product as a medication, it is interesting though. The third product is Stop Aiptasia. This product is great. It will eliminate the Aiptasia with just a little application with the easy to use applicator which I sell with the Stop Aiptasia. This product is also effective against Jellyfish larva and Hydroids.
The main ingredient in Stop Parasites is a pepper extract. The balance is other vegetable products. So no toxic ingredients are added to your tank.
Don't be discouraged if you are an international reader and think that you'd have to pay way more than you need too just because you can't find these products in your local store. I ship international. Not only that, but I pay half the shipping. I've cleared this with the manufacturer. There's no real reason why those overseas should have to pay more than those of us in the US. Oh, and I ship Priority Mail (national and international). Simply because, when someone orders Stop Parasites they need it now, not a week from now when regular mail would be delivered.
To demonstrate how sold I am on this product, I am offering a 16 oz. bottle of Stop Parasites to
one of you who has parasites in their tank. To qualify for this offer you must have parasites in
your tank now and be willing to give a write up here in the Fish & Chips newsletter that details your
fight against the parasites prior to your trying Stop Parasites, the treatment with Stop Parasites,
and the results. Obviously there is always a risk involved in treating your tank with medications,
etc. and you have to be willing to take that risk with no fault to me (in other words, just because
it worked for me, doesn't mean it will for you). Also, and finally, your write up becomes the
property of Fish & Chips to be published in a future issue with you given credit as author and
tester. If interested in this offer please submit your request to
jrc@seaponies.com
(information updated 4/19/00: GPS closed), with your tank
size, inhabitants, how long
you've had the parasites, and whether it is a reef tank (with live rock) or if it is a fish only
tank. If there are several of you wanting this offer, then I will submit the list to Elizabeth for
final selection.
As you can see, I am just an ordinary person who stumbled upon an excellent treatment for parasites and Aiptasia that worked in my tank and I'm in a position to pass along the information and most likely rid your tank of parasites at the same time.
Remember last month when I was telling you to store your deionized water in cleaned milk gallon jugs? Well, you may want to replace those jugs every couple of months. A couple of mine sprung a leak and lets just say I'm thankful they weren't being stored in any place important. So, Water Storage Tip #2 is... Replace those containers every three months or so AND store them someplace you don't mind a little water flowing just in case your container replacement timetable isn't precise yet!
To Submit Your Tip: Send your tip via email to
FishNChips@mail.com
(address updated 4/26/00) with a
subject of
Tip Submission
(information updated 4/26/00: coding replaces
need for subject notation) and I'll publish it in an upcoming issue of
Fish & Chips. I'll write it up for you or you can do it yourself if you are so inclined. Make sure
you let me know if I can include your name and email address or if you'd rather go anonymous.
AUTOZOOIDS - Polyps with eight well-developed tentacles that function in feeding and defense. In monomorphic species, these are the only polyp type. In dimorphic species, it is the larger, more conspicuous type of polyp.
GENERA - Genera is the plural of genus. In the taxonomy classification, the genus is the category ranking below a family and above a species. Simply said, it's a class, group, or kind with common attributes.
DETRITUS - Detritus are piles of organic compounds that accumulate in the aquarium. Commonly will contain fish wastes, fragments of rock, leftover food, and so on. Usually detritus will accumulate in low water flow areas (tank corners, sumps, etc.). Detritus is rich in plant nutrients (in other words, the bad algae's food) and should be removed via mechanical filtration, good circulation, siphoning, and water changes.
DINOFLAGELLATES - A group of single-celled microscopic organisms that belong to the kingdom Protista
DIMORPHIC - Corals with two different kinds of polyps are called dimorphic. The polyps themselves can also be referred to as dimorphic. The two polyp types are autozooids and siphonozooids
MONOMORPHIC - Corals with only one type of polyp are called monomorphic. The only polyps these corals have are autozooids.
OCTOCORAL - An octocoral is a member of the phylum Coelenterata (Cnidaria) class Anthozoa characterized by having (normally) eight featherlike (usually called pinnate) tentacles surrounding the mouth of each polyp. Cnidaria was formerly the phylum Coelenterata. The name Coelenterata is still in common use. The class Anthozoa contains the "flower-animals" - corals, anemones, and anemone-like creatures. A subclass of Anthozoa, Octocorallia, contains the soft corals. Simply, octocorals have eight tentacles on each polyp. There are many different forms which may be soft, leathery, or even those producing hard skeletons.
PEDUNCLE - A stalklike part or structure, foot.
PHYLUM - In the taxonomy classification, the phylum is the category ranking below a kingdom and above a class.
PHYTOPLANKTON - Microscopic algae which is suspended in the part of the water column that is penetrated by light.
RACHIS - The upper part of a pennatulacean (Sea Pen). The part of a Sea Pen which bears the polyps.
SCLERITES - Part of the skeletal/structural support in soft corals. They are composed of calcium carbonate imbedded in the tissue of most soft corals (octocorallia).
SESSILE - Permanently attached. For example, a barnacle.
SIPHONOZOOIDS - The smaller, less conspicuous polyp in dimorphic octocorals. These polyps are responsible for driving water currents through the large, fleshy octocorals.
STOLONS - Ribbon or root-like growth extensions that adhere to the substrate and link the polyps in Stoloniferan soft corals such as Clavularia spp. (common name - Clove or Glove Polyps). Stoloniferan corals are defined as those corals that match this description (polyps linked with root-like extensions adhering to the substrate).
TAXONOMY - The classification of organisms in an ordered system that indicates natural relationships.
ZOOPLANKTON - Animals that drift in the water column. Most zooplankton are microscopic and some are the larval forms of larger organisms.
ZOOXANTHELLAE - These are the tiny plants called dinoflagellates that live symbiotically with corals, tridacnid clams, and some sponges. They provide food to their host and in return get the nitrogen, phosphorous, and carbon dioxide they need for growth. Symbiodinium spp.
The American Heritage Dictionary, Third Edition, Copyright 1994 by Houghton Mifflin Company
AquaDirect by AquaLink, http://www.aquadirect.com
Invert-ual Realities Canada, http://www.interlog.com/~invertca/irc.htm (url dead 8/24/04)
Marine Depot, http://www.marinedepot.com
Ocean Realm Guide To Reef Creatures Marine Invertebrates, Text and Photography by Paul Humann, First Printing 1982, Ocean Realm Publishing Corporation
Paradise Aquarium, 66-16 Fresh Pond Road, Ridgewood, New York, USA (718) 366-6921
Premium Aquatics, http://www.premiumaquatics.com
The Reef Aquarium Volume One by J. Charles Delbeek and Julian Sprung, First Printing July 1994, Published by Ricordea Publishing
The Reef Aquarium Volume Two by Julian Sprung and J. Charles Delbeek, First Printing June 1997, Published by Ricordea Publishing
Reefers, http://www.acropora.com (url dead 10/03/05)
Reefkeeper's Frequently Asked Questions, Release 1.12, 8/17/94, found on AquaLink, http://www.aqualink.com
Simplified Reef Keeping, http://www.connix.com/~reefkeep/ (url dead 8/24/04)
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