Gonopora

[Paul B]

A gonopora is a coral that most people, Including me, have problems keeping for more than a year or two. I am really determined to find out why because it just annoys me. These things should live forever.
I have read all sorts of things about them and it seems that it is all incorrect.
I personally have not observed them much in the sea although I have seen them.
Even if I did, I would not be able to look at it long enough to watch it eat, if it even does eat.
The literature says they eat a variety of foods and in a tank will eat brine shrimp. I have not found that to be the case. I don't feed adult brine shrimp but I have been feeding them new born shrimp for a couple of months and I got to say that even while watching very close with a jewerer's loupe and squirting live shrimp all over them many times, I have yet to see them swallow one shrimp. I will stare at one polyp, very close up and using a pipette place shrimp right on it's tentacles and they just swim away. The tentacles are not at all sticky like an anemone and any food just falls off.
I know they live in water with a lot of detritus but they don't seem to consume that either.
I did however get a few polyp's to eat a small piece of live blackworm.
I will put a piece of a worm on a tentacle but it has to be a tentacle that is upright because the worms will just slide off. Then, if the worm stays there for a minute or two, the polyp will wrap it's arms around it like an octopus and in 15 or 20 minutes it will swallow it.
Yeah I know, you really got to be nuts to kneel in front of a tank with your face against the glass while wearing a jeweler's loupe squirting pieces of worm at a stupid animal that does not want to eat anyway.
So in an hour, I got two tentacles to eat an eight of an inch of worm.
I am not even 100% sure the thing is eating it or just being annoyed by it.
It seems to eat it but it is very hard to tell because after it wraps it's arms around the worm, the tentacle shrinks and gets covered by other polyps.
Of course this is just a test and I am not getting a full time job trying to feed this thing. Eventually it's going to have to eat pizza like the rest of us. :dance:

 

[NYreefNoob]

paul i havent ever tried one because of the track record of them. maybe they are more like a filter feeder and collecting stuff from water column, you tried phyto yet to see how they react ?

 

[Paul B]

NYreefNoob, I have had a bunch of them but none more than 2 years. I have tried detritus but as I said, nothing sticks to their tentacles. I am not even sure if they do eat

 

[NYreefNoob]

lol buy a plastic fake one, it will never die then, there are some really nice colored one's out there also, and not that i havent thrown money away in the hobby, but thats a definate loss down the road.

 

[Paul B]

NY, good idea.
I don't keep them because I want one, I keep them because I want to find out what makes them tick.
Now I guess I have to plan a gonopora diving trip :tongue1:

 

[myerst22]

I have "heard" that it all depends on the species of "gone" apora. Some do better than others. Just like elegence from different locales. T

 

[Awibrandy]

All I've got to say is: if there is anyone on MR that will find out what makes them tick it is you Paul.LOL

 

[Paul B]

Awilda, I got my hypodermic needles all set and I called Igor back from vacation

 

[Awibrandy]

Uhhhhhhhhh poor poor Igor!!

 

[Master Shake]

i heard of someone who had one for years and she told me the secret was no carbon and no over filtration (like reactors and skimmers). i didnt believe her.

 

[seahunt]

Have you read this

Perhaps the biggest breakthrough in my success with Goniopora has been food. Until very recently, the choices of food for Goniopora have been limited. Lately, two great foods have become available, frozen rotifers and DT's oyster eggs. Cyclop-eeze has been on the market for a few years. These foods are apparently closer to the fare that Goniopora ingest in the wild. I was successful with some Goniopora species for years without direct feeding; however, the systems were already geared towards high plankton growth. I also added some liquid foods including phytoplankton and juices from thawed strained frozen foods, most noticeably Cyclop-eeze. Upon starting a regular regimen of direct feeding, however, I have noticed a marked increase in growth of all species maintained. Larger polyped varieties, including the commonly imported G. stokesi, require heavy regular feeding to support their colonies. I have recently experimented with peppermint shrimp eggs and blood from a bag of fresh striped bass. Many of the hard-to-keep Goniopora had a strong feeding response to these foods. The development of new foods could possibly be directed towards invertebrate egg and larvae production. We can now get many kinds of shrimp to spawn. Their eggs, and I think their larvae, could be harvested as food for Goniopora and other corals.

 

[Awibrandy]

Nice Seahunt! Let's see what happens to my little frag since I do feed just about all of the above.

 

[Paul B]

I don't have any carbon and no reactors but I do have a skimmer. I will chamoflage it so the gonopora can't see it. :tongue1:


Sea Hunt, I do feed saltwater fish eggs but I have not tried these on the gonopora yet. Thanks, I will try that also. So far, I study the thing very closely with magnifying goggles and I have only seen it eat tiny pieces of live blackworms. Fish eggs have about the same consistancy so it sounds good. I will let you know.
Thanks.
Paul

 

[marrone]

There use to be a website, www.goniopora.org, that had a lot of information on keepping goniopora, including propagating of it. Some, like the Red with Blue centers, can live for a number of years and grow pretty large.

 

[Paul B]

Marrone, thanks for the site. I read all of it and have been incorporating some of the techniques as I have kept gonopora many times.
Now I am retired and have a little more time to investigate better.
I would really like to take a diving trip to some gomopora habitats but now my daughter is getting married so that may preclude a few dive trips.
Unless she elopes :tongue1:

 

[bizarrecorals]

Stay away from goniporas + elegance, if they're not collected right, they won't make it, unless if you can find agriculture, which I doubt.

 

[Dre]

stay away from goniporas + elegance, if they're not collected right, they won't make it, unless if you can find agriculture, which i doubt.

what!

 

[beerfish]

People used to stay away from saltwater fish because they couldn't be kept alive. Then corals, then SPS corals. If everyone stayed away from these things, we wouldn't have reefs in our living rooms.

A lot of people don't realize this, but we're involved in one of the few hobbies out there that drives the commercial industry. For example, initially large scale protein skimmers were extremely expensive, and most major aquariums weren't willing to spend the money on an unproven technology. Smaller skimmers, that would work on a hobbyist's tank were more cost effective and put in place more frequently. This eventually let to a proven technology employed in aquariums around the world.

I think it's great for an experienced reefer to study a coral like this and try to advance the hobby. Paul isn't exactly a beginner, so if anyone is going to experiment with this type of coral, I'd much rather it be someone like him.

I myself have been interested in trying to keep a species only carnation coral tank.

 

[Slamajamajama]

Have you read this

Perhaps the biggest breakthrough in my success with Goniopora has been food. Until very recently, the choices of food for Goniopora have been limited. Lately, two great foods have become available, frozen rotifers and DT's oyster eggs. Cyclop-eeze has been on the market for a few years. These foods are apparently closer to the fare that Goniopora ingest in the wild. I was successful with some Goniopora species for years without direct feeding; however, the systems were already geared towards high plankton growth. I also added some liquid foods including phytoplankton and juices from thawed strained frozen foods, most noticeably Cyclop-eeze. Upon starting a regular regimen of direct feeding, however, I have noticed a marked increase in growth of all species maintained. Larger polyped varieties, including the commonly imported G. stokesi, require heavy regular feeding to support their colonies. I have recently experimented with peppermint shrimp eggs and blood from a bag of fresh striped bass. Many of the hard-to-keep Goniopora had a strong feeding response to these foods. The development of new foods could possibly be directed towards invertebrate egg and larvae production. We can now get many kinds of shrimp to spawn. Their eggs, and I think their larvae, could be harvested as food for Goniopora and other corals.

i just purchased a red goni, the link was very helpful, tyvm

 

[SevTT]

Try small food items -- cyclop-eez, oyster eggs, bass blood ... things like that. Despite the longish tentacles it seems that many gonoporia feed on very small food items.