Nudibranch Search

[Dorkel Marine 1]

8) My son Jeffrey was wanting to find a website on information concerning Nudibranches. Can anyone help us.

Thanx in advance

George and Jeff Muller

[EmilyB]

:D This is the home of the sea slug...http://www.seaslugforum.net/

[Dorkel Marine 1]

Thanks Emily. Pretty thorough. Looking forward to reading stuff. I already found out what certain little creatures on my cheap live rock from J&L are called now. There Known as sea squirts. I have a few growing on a certain piece of Live rock I got at J&L's because the rock was about 4 bucks a lb. There very interesting they are called ascidians.

Do any of you guys have any experience with Nudibranches obtained locally. I've only seen the lettuce ones at J&L and one spectacular purple pink and white thing at king Eds one day a while back.

Again Thanks

[christyf5]

DO NOT get the "spectacular purple and white thing from King Ed". I had one. they are poisonous and if they die in your tank everything croaks. I am speaking from experience here. Pretty colors for nudis usually means poisonous and IMO not worth the risk. I don't think they have the greatest survival rate either :(

ChristY :)

Yes I'd also like to mention that I bought this when I was "young and stupid" :roll: :wink:

[Troy F]

http://rfbolland.com/okislugs/ is another site to check out.

[Troy F]

Bah, there's a link to it in Deb's link.

[canadawest]

I brought home one of the "purple, pink and white" Nudibranchs from King Ed on Monday. Lived for about 24 hours in my tank, laid eggs, then was found lying motionless on the sandbed the day after.

While I cant share the same they are poisonous and if they die in your tank everything croaksexperience as Christy (my tank hasn't missed a beat since) I do also caution against purchasing Nudis for home aquaria.

I also tried the Lettuce Nudis that J&L was carrying last summer in an attempt to battle my hair algae at the time. Again, had tje two survive for about 1 and 2 weeks respectively, both laying eggs then both whither away and die within 24 hours of egg laying.

It seems to me that after my recent experience, this is a common thing with Nudibranchs and seems money wasted. I've never heard of anyone locally that has sucessfully kept a Nudibranch for an extended period of time (longer than 6 months).

[christyf5]

Well Andrew, I should probly state that at the time I had a huge 20G tank :P It probly was a little more dramatic in 20G of water than 100 (I think thats what yours is?). Ammonia was through the roof!

Christy :)

[Troy F]

Hobbyists attempts at keeping the sea slugs are usually futile as they are such specialized feeders. Andrew, you're probably lucky it did die. The chances of it eating some type of coral in your tank are pretty good. I'd suspect that there was some type of shock for it to die in less than a day though (although I guess it would depend on how long it had been in captivity).

A hobbyist can be forgiven such a mistake once but shouldn't a place that sells these animals have a better understanding of their care requirements?

[Pansy-Paws]

We bought one of the pretty little lettuce ones this Sat at J&L. Sunday we couldn't see it and and still can't find it. :cry: Could it have looked very tasty to our Foxface or Tang? The lettuce slugs are photosythetic eaters and eat algae to make the cloraplast (sp?) that they need for the photosyn. process -- so we thought he'd stay out in the light if he was still around. We had heard that success was iffy, but we did want to give it a go.

[Dorkel Marine 1]

Andrew just wanted to let you know, the Christmas tree coral has decided to belong. It was standing up this morning enjoying the morning sun. Are you sure Andrew it is a Christmas tree coral looks alittle bit like the colt coral I recieved from Sam W. Either way its great and lookin happy this mornin.

Getting back on track thanks everyone for the input on Nudi's. My son agrees there not good for the tank.

Thanks George

[canadawest]

I'm pretty sure it's a Christmas Tree coral, as it exibits the typical "shrivelling up" behavior occasionally, which my colt coral does not do.

I suspect that with the colt, sinularia and Studeriotes sp being so similar in many ways, that a positive ID would be difficult unless done by an expert, which I am certainly not.

In any event it looks similar to pictures I've seen online, behaves similarly to published texts, so I figure it must be a Christmas Tree coral? :?:

But it's good to hear that it's settled in.