something very strange

[zhenya]

something very strange just happened in my 110g anemone tank while I went to take a shower I came downstairs to find a cloudy tank, I mean I can't see anything. Not sure if something spawned or not.I don't have anything in there except those anemones also, the water is foamy in the sump(white foam).
I checked ph and it's like 8.4.I did not add anything to the tank either, no alk or calcium additives to precipitate. Hmmm.

[zhenya]

Looks like a long night for me tonight.Mixing 30g of water as I speak and will do a water change. I can't even begin to imagine what could have happened in 15 minutes while I was in the shower. I looked into a tank just before I went upstairs and everything seemed the same. Anemones did look a bit weird in terms that they had their foot expanded to great sizes and had short tentacles.

I seriously doubt that E. quads reproduce sexually, especially in captivity.
Wish me luck.

[Poseidon]

YIKES!!!

Good luck Gene, My tank looked like that once when I mixed Sea Chem Alk and Ca raising products... Can't remember teh names but it turned my tank to milk...

[zhenya]

It seems that I am talking to myself, for that I am sorry.

But, I figured I'll give a last update before I go to bed.
After water change I decided to clean out the skimmer as well. let me tell you, it was filled with some type of white stringy and sticky stuff, Lots of it
Enough to fill a small bucket with it. More and more I think that it was some sort of reproductive orgy...what a mess Fish looks to be freaked out and I noticed my Foxface is in his distress coloring and breathing heavy. I hate to do another 30g water change but I might have to if push comes to shove.As soon as my RO/DI produces enough water that is.
Why does it have to always happen at night? Keep dirty jokes out of it, please

[zhenya]

YIKES!!!

Good luck Gene, My tank looked like that once when I mixed Sea Chem Alk and Ca raising products... Can't remember teh names but it turned my tank to milk...

Mike, I have not added anything in at least 4 days. I add baking soda for alk and calcium chloride for calcium, that is all.Oh, I do drip kalk but not every night. The levels stay put for long time as I don't have much in terms of corals there.
This is the weirdest thing I've seen so far in my over six years experience with reef tanks.
Water is slowly clearing up but not enough to see anything yet. I can make out some stuff that is closest to the glass but that is it. I just hope I don't lose any fish tonight or tomorrow becouse of this.

[saltjunkie]

dang............ did the water change help? have you figured it out yet.. i know you did not get much sleep...
let us know???

[Samper]

Man Zhenya.........I didn't expect to wake up and find you of all people stumped on something. Obviously you know what you're doing and maybe you have experienced something in your aquarium that has yet to be accomplished. I can't imagine what it would have been other than some sort of sexual release into the water column. What do the anemones look like this morning?

[Samper]

http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/e...sh_1000860.htm

[Samper]

After reading the article you might be pleased to find that your tank conditions are obviously excellent in order for this to happen. Wayne Shang has spawning clams and you may have spawning anemones.

[zhenya]

Thanks for the link, Samper. I do know that E.quadricolor reproduce by both methods in the wild but I never heard of them trying to do it in captivity. I wasn't up to do any researches last night as I was busy.

This morning I found this tank a tad clearer but no way near what it usually is. Clear enough for me to see some things, like my fish who are still stressed to certain degree. Especially my Siganus unimaculatus who is still in his stressed coloration and defensive posture. I have just enough water now made to do another large water change, hopefully it will help the fish. I threw two bags of carbon in the sump last night so hopefully I can clear up this mess soon.
I'll post some more pics as soon as I can.

PS. From limited visibility for observation, I can see that anemones appear OK, somewhat lighter in color.In fact, I noticed lightening in color last night,come to think of it. All snail are happily grazing on the glass in various places and seem unaffected. The large Clark's anemonefish is also fine in appearance.
Corals,and I have four in there, all seem to be OK. Last night they were stressed and shedd lots of mucous that was floating everywhere but today they appear normal. My only concern at this point is my four fish, they all large fish and I do not have any means to quarantine them.
Well, I'm off to do another water change.

[kevinpo]

Hi Gene,
It certainly sounds like a spawning event to me. I've had several of them from clams and corals and it happens pretty much like you are describing. Water changes are really the best way to clean things up. Running carbon also helps.

Regards,
Kevin

[zhenya]

Hi Gene,
It certainly sounds like a spawning event to me. I've had several of them from clams and corals and it happens pretty much like you are describing. Water changes are really the best way to clean things up. Running carbon also helps.

Regards,
Kevin

Hi Kevin,

Thanks for replying. I am mixing second 30g of salt water and will do a water change in 30 minutes or so. Took some pics while water is mixing and will post them a bit later after I resize and edit them. Will probably run to the store and pic up another container of GAC as I've used up all I had. Skimmer stopped working too...I think the beckett got clogged up with the goo from the orgy so another chore to do this morning.
Why do I have to clean up after they had all the fun?

[Poseidon]

LOL!!!

Well sounds like all will work out okay for you. You are going to have to open a LFS specializing in E. quads, just till you get rid of all but one...

Good luck with the water changes, do you have any mechanical filter you could put on there temporaly until you catch all the goo... I have 2 Aqua Clear 300's I keep in the closet until I need them, like after I re-scape. I also keep about 25 gallons of salt water mixed and ready, just like you! If that doesn't fix it, I can use the 20 gallons or so of fresh I keep, but after that I am SOL!!!

I am relieved that everything seems to be doing good, other then the one fish

[zhenya]

LOL!!!

Well sounds like all will work out okay for you. You are going to have to open a LFS specializing in E. quads, just till you get rid of all but one...

Good luck with the water changes, do you have any mechanical filter you could put on there temporaly until you catch all the goo... I have 2 Aqua Clear 300's I keep in the closet until I need them, like after I re-scape. I also keep about 25 gallons of salt water mixed and ready, just like you! If that doesn't fix it, I can use the 20 gallons or so of fresh I keep, but after that I am SOL!!!

I am relieved that everything seems to be doing good, other then the one fish

Mike, the foxface seem to have come down and looks much better at this point so I'm hopeful that all fish will make out OK through this.
You are right about the E.quads, I need to get rid of all of them except one or two. It's getting rediculous. I just need to catch that clownfish so I can do it without being eaten alive by her She's a mean damsel.
Here are some pics from today.

[Samper]

Zhenya as far as I can tell you are the first person to experience something like this in a smaller aquarium. Maybe someone will chime in and correct me but I couldn't find any evidence that it's been accomplished before. There will surely be some guys interested in studying how you accomplished this. Sucks that it's such a mess but it says a lot about the conditions in your tank. Definately keep us posted. I'm interested to see if it starts happening on a regular basis.

[zhenya]

Zhenya as far as I can tell you are the first person to experience something like this in a smaller aquarium. Maybe someone will chime in and correct me but I couldn't find any evidence that it's been accomplished before. There will surely be some guys interested in studying how you accomplished this. Sucks that it's such a mess but it says a lot about the conditions in your tank. Definately keep us posted. I'm interested to see if it starts happening on a regular basis.

Samper, thanks for the complement but I sincerely hope that you are wrong and it will not happen on regular basis. I don't want to deal with this ever again. Nothing good can happen out of this since all I have is bunch of males,I need to research this a bit more and see what type of anemones carry both eggs and sperm.But I think that most of them have separate sexes throughout their lifes and both participate in reproduction.
So, this shooting blanks buiseness better stop 'cause I don't feel like cleaning up afterwards

I will contact Ron Shimek a bit later to see what he has to say about all of this. I didn't take any pictures of the goop( I probably should've but I simply flushed it down the drain), it looked a bit on the disgusting side
Will keep you posted guys.

PS. Samper, no, I am not the first person to have this happen in aquarium. Sanjay Joshi had his male clones spawn in his tank and one of the moderators on RC( Anemone) had his female clones spawn as well. I had communicated with Kevin(Anemone) and he confirmed that this were more then likely a spawning event in my tank as well. If I had both female and male I would still get no babies That had never been done yet. Something to do with the food in larval stages,I think.

[Samper]

HAH i know it must be a mess. It's still a positive sign and proof that you are a good aquarist. Thanks for the info and pics.

[zhenya]

HAH i know it must be a mess. It's still a positive sign and proof that you are a good aquarist. Thanks for the info and pics.

Things seems to be improving rapidly and decided to delay second water change untill later tonight. Exchanging 60 gallons in a 110g tank at one time could do more harm than good, I think. The fish swims normally and heavy breathing stopped.
Here's interesting article about Entacmaea quadricolor, if you scroll down a bit you'll find some information on sexual reproduction.
http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issu...02/feature.htm

Interestingly, I always thought that fertilization occured in the water after females released their eggs but it seems that femails take in the sperm that is released by males and furtilize eggs internally. Short developement occurs internally as well in the bulbs of tentacles into a planulae and even zooxanthellae is passed on by a mother. It's released then into the water column to settle somewhere on acceptable substrate.

[Poseidon]

I know it hasn't been accomplished yet, but Gene I'll bet if you did have a Female in there she would be knocked up for CERTAIN with all that Sperm you had to clean up!!! EWWWW

At what stage have previous attempts failed? Sometime after the release of the fertilized egg? Or was the problem getting the egg fertilized in the first place?

Anyway like Samper said, you should be a proud Pappa!!! 9 Strong and the family still wants to GROW!! YIKES

[saltjunkie]

well heck we know why the fish are p oed... i would be too any of us with that much sperm just dropping all over you...........