Flame "scallop"

[danmhippo]

Was reading the very interesting article by Toonen today on the flame file clam :wink: , and start wondering if I can provide proper care for these wonderful animal that I had terrible time with before but may now be able to try again.

I wonder if instant algae paste such as taihetian blend would increase the survival rate of these bi-valves? I believe the phytoplankton in the Taihitian blend are Nannochloropsis, T-Isochrysis, Tetraselmis, and Pavlova. All of these phyto sizes range from 2 to 15 micron, which falls in the acceptable food size range for these file clams. If that is the case, at what density should the food be offered in a aquarium? The direction reads 2 drops of instant algae paste per 10 gallon of tank water. Would this be enough concentration for them to filter through water? Or higher?

Higher concentration in my tank should not be too much problem as I also have sponges that can benefit from higher density, but just wondering if these clams comes from nutrient rich waters that we probably has no way of mimicing the natural nutrient concention of the water where they come from?

 

[Biogeek]

The foods that you're using now ought to be fine, danmhippo, but I would recommend that you use less of the products more often rather than try to feed a lot of it just one time per day - if it were me, I'd be more inclined to split the same amount of food per day over three or so feedings each day rather than just dump it all in at once. The animals are not really able to take advantage of super-abundant food when it is around, and your skimmer should remove most of the stuff before the flame scallop really gets a chance to eat it.

I'd also suggest that you take a look at the Instant Algae Calculator rather than just simply use the drop per 10 gallon instructions. You'd like to aim for a cell density in your tank of about 10,000 cells per ml each feeding to keep these guys well fed, so that translates to roughly 0.03 ml per 10 gallons... (BTW, there are approximately 20 drops per ml, or very roughly 0.05 ml per drop) Unfortunately the mixture of Tahitian Blend is not at 1:1 of each cell type, so there are roughly something like 19 times as many Nanno cells per drop as any of the other species of phytoplankton. Although the clams would likely benefit most from the larger cell sizes in the mixture, T-blend is pretty strongly biased toward the 2 um side by the abundance of Nannochloropsis...

If you would like some more detail on the subject, check out the archives of my phytoplankton posts that discuss these issues in great detail...

Rob

 

[danmhippo]

Thanks a bunch. I will get on it (reading your article).

 

[Marcosreef]

This was a very good article on flame scallops.

I began reefkeeping in March 2001, when I purchased my 12 eclipse system.

Unfortunately, like most aspiring aquarists, I took in the info provided by my local LFS as credible and reliable without researching it myself. (He tried selling me a undergravel system.)

One of the first things that caught my eye was the Flame Scallop. At only $10 was a good deal for such a vivid creature, so I bought it.

I upgraded my tank to a 29 in Dec 2001, the scallop came as well.

Well, 18 months later, I still have it, and it buried itself into the rockwork, and has been there since Dec. when the 29 was set up.

Needless to say, I have not a clue why it's survived this long.

Regards, Marco

 

[blade2run]

Where can i go to get DTs plankton?