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- From: spass@or.credence.com (Spass Stoiantschewsky)
- Subject: Re: [M] Cowfish, live rock and beginners...
- Message-ID: <1993Jan25.194916.9396@credence.com>
- Sender: news@credence.com
- Nntp-Posting-Host: colorado
- Organization: Credence Systems Corp. Beaverton, OR
- References: <C19snz.1uLC@austin.ibm.com>
- Date: Mon, 25 Jan 1993 19:49:16 GMT
- Lines: 71
-
- In some article steve@coho.austin.ibm.com (sTeVeN CaLlAhAn) writes:
- >Well, my thanks to David Packer for solving the mysterious death of my
- >poor cowfish.
-
- ...mmm...i wouldn't be so quick to make this call.
-
- >I believe that my live rock DID kill my cow. However it was not parasites
- >that were on the rock that floated out into the water. Instead it was
- >the fact that the cow was eating stuff off of the live rock all the time.
-
- shouldn't have been a problem. fish usually know what they can and cannot
- eat. they just don't understand "balanced diet".
-
- >I have two different types of live rock. One type is covered with purple
- >sponge. The other is some kind of orange stuff. The orange stuff is
- >starting to flake and fall off making a mess in my tank.
-
- ok, so it is dying. if it is a sponge, maybe it needs more/less direct
- water flow. if it is a calcerous algae maybe it needs more/less light,
- more/less calcium in the water...lacking strontium? pull out the rock
- and scrape/break off the stuff that is obviously dead.
-
- >The reason that the cowfish was affected was that
- >it was always eating stuff off of the orange rock. The other fish
- >never grazed my live rock, and thus are still alive. Alas, what is this
- >orange stuff that is on this rock? Why is it peeling off? The rock itself
- >is very fragile and breaks if mishandled.
-
- some live rock i've seen is very fragile. depending on which coral formed
- the "rock" the calcerous skeleton may be thick or thin walled (assuming it
- was a coral rock...I have some "tubeworm" rock--very light, very fragile, no
- coral at all). the orange stuff is most likely yet another variety
- of sponge.
-
- NOTE: some sponges release toxins as they die, and you may see problems
- arising from this. it is generally a good idea to scrape sponges off your
- liverock if the rock has been removed from the water for a longer period
- of time...sponges grow back quite easily from just a few cells left on the
- rock. Obviously if you are buying a big sponge, you might not want to
- follow the advice to "scrape off the sponges and throw them out". In this
- case you want to make sure that the sponge is never allowed to "drain"--
- big sponges should not be pulled out of the water because air bubbles
- get trapped in the sponge and the sponge dies if it cannot rid itself of the
- air bubbles. Bad news. And don't expect to be able to "see" the air bubbles,
- they can be quite small...think about how your shop handles big sponges
- before buying one.
-
- Another thing the "orange stuff" could be is a calcerous algae. This
- shouldn't be a problem...
-
- All in all, i'd have to say that i doubt that the live rock was your problem,
- and definitely *DO NOT* "treat" your tank with medication if you have liverock
- in there. This is probably the worst thing you can do.
-
- i can't tell you what got your cowfish (swim bladder problem? stung by
- something? bad food--what are *you* feeding it? old age? water problem?
- the orange stuff decaying?). it could even have been something hereditary!
-
- i had a leopard wrasse for about a year and one day before *my* dinner
- i looked in my tank and everything was just fine, and after my dinner my
- wrasse was dead. Nothing was new in the tank for a *long* time. Bang.
- i write that one off to a coronary failure. who knows? by the way this
- was a really cool fish...and i've never seen another.
-
- good luck.
-
- ~spass
-
- --
- spass otto stoiantschewsky "mmm...i think it's time to flush the goldfish"
- put this subject in your kill file
-