button coral gone overnight

[new2salt2]

well it happend again. i had purchased one single button coral to test in my tank. for and entire week it was doing real well.. opening, closeing and feeding. this morning i turned on my light to find the coral completely gone from its rock...

my water levels are fine. i do have a large hermit crab (about the size of a golf ball), brittle star and a pepermint shrimp. they the only things i can think of eating my coarl. has anyone else had this problem before? any ideas what i can to keep this from happing again?

[tasha369]

My turbo snail decided to take a short cut over my button corals and knocked them loss, but they did not die they just floated away. I put them on another rock and it was fine. Maybe yours is somewhere else in the tank too.

[zhenya]

well it happend again. i had purchased one single button coral to test in my tank. for and entire week it was doing real well.. opening, closeing and feeding. this morning i turned on my light to find the coral completely gone from its rock...

my water levels are fine. i do have a large hermit crab (about the size of a golf ball), brittle star and a pepermint shrimp. they the only things i can think of eating my coarl. has anyone else had this problem before? any ideas what i can to keep this from happing again?

I'm not sure if I would implicate your hermit or the brittle star but peppermint shrimp would be on my list for sure. They are notorious polyp eaters(just look what they can do to Aiptasia) and if hungry enough they will munch on the coral polyps. Hermit crab that large would probably go after something meatier,like worms and other things in your tank but I doubt it ate your polyp.

[new2salt2]

hmm yea was supicious of shrimp myself. i bought it at same time and he has not eaten the aptasia yet but the coral was on rock laying onsubstrate.. would not be too hard to do .. bummer.. it is not possible to have a health problem in coral so that they completley disapear over night is it?

[zhenya]

...it is not possible to have a health problem in coral so that they completley disapear over night is it?

Sure it is possible.But I think you should've noticed some signs of decline prior to that.Right? Like was it closed for prolonged periods of time, was it eating and then stopped...and many other signs that would lead you to believe that the coral in question was in trouble. You didn't mention anything in this regard so I'm assuming that the coral was healthy and were just eaten by something/someone. Do you have any other names for your coral besides "button",like the scientific name possibly.It would certainly help in trying to figure out what was eaten and by whom ;) I'm leaning towards the idea that a Lysmata sp. shrimps would go after a LPS or a discosoma and other type mushrooms. If your coral was a Palythoa or Protopalythoa type polyp,I'm not sure what would eat those due to their ability to release toxin Palytoxin. Some snails eat those and other type zoanthids so it is possible that you might have some critter in there that are able to eat it.

[new2salt2]

i dont have the scientific name for the coral. just said green button coral, but it was more like a brown. had it for a week and was doing real well. no signs of problems. i got my shrimp same day, but if they only scavange he might have been hungry enough, though he has yet to eat my aptasia. ill dump him soon enough tho if he dont eat the aptasia since that was why i bought him.

[zhenya]

i dont have the scientific name for the coral. just said green button coral, but it was more like a brown. had it for a week and was doing real well. no signs of problems. i got my shrimp same day, but if they only scavange he might have been hungry enough, though he has yet to eat my aptasia. ill dump him soon enough tho if he dont eat the aptasia since that was why i bought him.

That's the problem with the common names of corals,it's very confusing.
Some people call Cynarina lacrymalis a button coral,cat's eye coral,doughnut coral and then again, some people call Scolymia a doughnut coral,button coral or tooth coral and so on. Confusing I tell you! :eek3:

Regardless,though, I think it could be your peppermint shrimp at fault or it could be something else,really hard to say.I just thought that I point out that they are known to prey on polyps and in fact are very adept to do so by nature. So are lots of so called cleaner shrimps as well. I think the reason your shrimp might not eat the Aiptasia is becouse perhaps it is not a 'true peppermint" or Lysmata wundermani shrimp,which is the only one known to eat that particular anemone. Lots of other shrimps sold as such but they might not be what they appear. Keep an eye on him and try to feed it once in a while,they get really mean when they hungry

[Minh Nguyen]

It is hard for ne shrimp to finish a polyp over night, assuming the polyp is about 1/3-1/2 inches in diameter. The large crab is the most likely offender IMO.
Minh

[new2salt2]

well they both have dates for the LFS soon...either way i am tired of trying balance water only to find that this stuff happens.. grrrr. thanks for your help.