Corals that can compete with Mushrooms??

[TimmyD]

After adding a small piece of rock with 3 tiny mushrooms on it over a year ago, my tank is now becoming over run with hundreds of shrooms. They are even growing on the glass.

Are there any corals out there that can out sting mushrooms?

 

[Len]

Most LPS can. Euphyllias (hammers, torches, frogspawns, etc.) can, as can Plerogyra(bubble corals). Anything that sends out sweepers can as well. These include Galaxia and Closed/Maze Brains (Favia, Favites, Platygyra, etc.). I've also found some open brains (e.g. Lobophyllia) handle adjacent mushrooms relatively well.

You can also try Leather Corals (Sarcophyton sp.). Their stalks are nearly impervious to mushroom stings, and their canopy may effectively shade mushrooms below, reducing their potency/population.

I inject hot kalkwasser to kill my mushrooms. It works well, but can't be done on tanks smaller then 100 gallons since kalk raises the pH too fast.

A suggestion for people keeping mushrooms for the first time. Scatter a bunch of loose rubble rock around the initial colony to encompass it. When the shooms start spreading they'll spread onto the rubble rock, which can be easily removed and traded/sold. Of course, replace rocks you remove with new ones.

(too many typos )

 

[Anemone]

IME, mushrooms can cause damage to fleshy stoney corals. Although mushrooms don't have sweepers, I have often seen flesh retraction and then exposed skeleton at points of contact between many of the fleshy stoney corals listed above and mushrooms.

Any mushrooms on the glass should be easy to remove (and maybe recycle to your LFS for credit), and even in smaller tanks you can do the kalk injection (which can be effective in killing all sorts of unwanted growths), as long as you limit how many mushrooms you inject at a time.

I don't know what your lighting is, but both hydnophora and galaxea corals have very powerful stings, so those are both possibilities as well.

Finally, I've found that green star polyps, once established, have chased most of the mushrooms off their rocks (the mushrooms have the "choice" of either bailing off the rock or being overgrown). Of course, you then have the problem of stopping the GSP growth, which can be as bad as (or worse than) the mushrooms.

FWIW,

Kevin

 

[Len]

Problem with Kalk is even in minute quantities, it raises pH very rapidly. Injecting only 5cc's (enough dosage to kill 1-2 mushrooms) of kalk noticeably elevates my 120's pH. I can only image what it'd do in, say, a 29 gallon.

Our experiences differ on LPS. In my tanks, almost every Euphylllia specimen has been able to ward off corallimorphs. My Lobophyllia is completely encircled by mushrooms without displaying adverse effects. Plerogyra will sting neighboring mushrooms to death, and as mentioned, anything with long sweepers (favites, platygyra, galexia, et. al.) dominate shrooms. Of course, they dominate just about everything else either, so beware.

 

[fishfarmer]

Closed/Maze Brains (Favia, Favites, Platygyra, etc.).

FWIW I have what I believe is a Platygyra brain. I've noticed my green striped shrooms kill off the edges of it when they migrate too close.

 

[Len]

Hmmm. Allow me rescind my original blanket suggetions since it appears some shrooms/corals have different interactions from tank to tank, species to species, and specimen to specimen.

Here's my expereriences in my tanks: I have a Platygra that has a perfect 2" diamter circumference around it because of the sweepers it sends out. No shrooms (or any other coral for that matter) are allowed to encroach beyond this point. I also have a red Lobophyllia that doesn't seem at all bothered by being surrounded by purple mushrooms, and a Plerogyra sinuosa that beats back shrooms with its tentacles. Then there's the E.glabrescens kills everything down-current of it, including shrooms.

But experiences vary, so take my suggestions accordingly.

 

[danmhippo]

Harvesting them is the easiest thing I can think of removing them from your tank. Many LFS welcomes these mushroom rocks.

 

[MFisher]

If an mushroom has white edges near another coral, it is stinging it (and usually winning) when I see the white edges (nematocyst batteries) I know that the mushroom is offensively stinging the coral. They won't hurt sarcophyton, lobos etc. but will kill most hard corals (hydnophora included). I just hack up my mushrooms when they get close to stuff and that sets them back for several months. Also I have a heliofungia that is a megastinger (as in OUCH!). It will kill mushrooms and the polyps only stretch so far. It could be used to kill mushrooms close to another coral without worries of sweepers stretching and killing the coral of value. Plus it deflates at night. The problem with a HF is that it isn't fond of life on the rocks so it is hard to use effectively (plus mine is the size of a dinner plate).

sorry for rambling.

matt