Over the last couple months, it has been spreading like mad. I’ve had a patch of it in my tank for +2 years, but it is just now that it has decided to take off, and it getting a bit out of hand. So that leads me to a related dilemma: my clownfish. My pair of A. percula took this Xenia as home within 24 hours of being put into the tank, and the momma defends it to the death. I’ve been considering fluke tab removal of the Xenia, but I don’t want to deprive the clowns of their home.

My 2 thoughts have been a) once the tank gets back on track and I’ve manually removed as much as possible form the areas I don’t want it, possibly the once again clean water will keep it contained as it used to be. Or, b) remove the rock w/ Xenia that the clownfish host in, QT it, fluke the tank, and then put the rock back in. The issue I have with ‘B’ is that I am afraid any leftover trace of the fluke tabs may kill of the Xenia I wanted to save… but the plus side of ‘B’ is that I also have some anthelia and GSP that I definitely want no trace of, ever again, and the fluke tabs may take care of that…

decisions, decisions…

Off to do some reading on experiences with fluke tabs… here’s a video (cloudy after extreme maintenance). See, how could one possibly take the clowns from that xenia… I think they’d be devastated :). Check out the Ecsenius stigmatura about 1:30 in, cleaning out the kicked up sand from his hole. Also think I may have to hack down the M. capricornis a bit to re-position that rock.

*Post Script - I’ve halted all dosing of Fauna Marin products while I continue renovation. I am still running a reactor / stones, but have stopped all Power Trace, Bak, AA’s, etc. Until I get a grip, just sticking with bi-weekly doses of Prodibio bacs and carbon source.

** I emailed LiveAquaria.com last night and got a response this morning - they’re wild caught clowns….

I didn’t see it mentioned when I bought them, and probably overlooked it, seeing as there are captive bred A. percula clowns from Solomon Islands as well. As I understand it, the percs from that area tend to have more black, so I might have assumed that was implied by the title on the LiveAquaria.

Had I noticed that, I may not have purchased them, since I now tend to avoid buying wild caught livestock. I do have a couple WC peppermint shrimp (Lysmata wurdemanni) in the tank, and I do have Solomon Island live rock as well, but I really try and keep that at a minimum. With the availability of tank raised livestock (for great A. percula, check out Rod’s Reef), it isn’t necessary to take much from the reefs. So I emailed liveaquaria to make sure I at least know what I have in the tank, and, indeed, they’re WC clowns.

I may also have hesitated, had I noticed, because WC clowns are known to come in with brooknella and / or nasty internal parasites. That would usually worry me. One thing the Drs. Foster & Smith definitely have going for them (aside from a very nice selection of livestock (much of it aqua cultured) and a 14 day guarantee) is their quarantine facility and attention to livestock that they import - it is pretty impressive, to say the least.

Here’s are some excerpts from an article, written by their director, about their Aquaculture Coral and Marine Life Facility.

…We have three dedicated fish systems here at our facility, and none of them are run with antibiotics in the water. Two of the three fish systems are run with copper sulfate, and Copper sulfate with formalin in the water to treat fish that have Amyloodinium or Cryptocaryon. We do not house fish in this medication for months. Any experienced person who has handled fish for many years in this industry will tell you that this combination of medications is the best way to kill Cryptocaryon in a closed system, when it is administered in the proper amounts and dosages…

…As far as medication with antibiotics for bacterial infections, we do NOT create some antibiotic soup to treat these fish, nor do we run antibiotics in ANY of our systems. Your interpretation of what we have written again is far from the truth. I have listed some of the more common medications that we use in our facility to treat fish that have Vibrio or other bacterial infections. We prefer to medicate fish properly rather than watching them perish in our hands. Antibiotic baths means just that, the fish is placed in an individual isolation tank/container with an air stone and is bathed in the antibiotic we have chosen to administer. We do not dump these antibiotics into our fish systems as it would create major problems on many fronts from destroying the nitrifying bacteria to creating resistant strains of bacteria that would be detrimental to our fish. We employ ozone and UV sterilization to limit bacterial pathogens from spreading to other fish….

Here are a couple more pics…

this:

and these:

And after those little guys get used to the tank, I’ll add this to the mix:

The Vortech, yeah. I’m going to upgrade within a year, so I’ll use that as justification. I currently have 2 Tunze 6025’s for flow, which do a great job, but they’re a little intrusive, and the flow pattern is not as dispersed as I’d like. Plus, what the hell…

I’ve not had luck in the past with clownfish. Bought a gorgeous pair of ORA Picassos a few months ago - one of them died within a week, the other very shortly thereafter. I hope these guys do a little better - it is a pair of Solomon Island clowns from LiveAquaria’s Diver’s Den. They’re about twice the size of the picasso percs I got, and look a little fatter / healthier as well. Fingers are crossed regardless. I saw their pic and already had the credit card out for the Vortech.

And the A. soli… Much thanks to the guys at Glassbox for posting random pics of their favorite specimens, again I found myself at the liveaquaria website starting at this little nub of aquacultured Acropora solitaryensis… no justification necessary…