Gorgonia ventilana aka heaven ...

Delphinus · #1 01-06-2011, 06:42 AM

Repost from reeftools but had to share.

Gorgonia ventilana as far as the eye can see. Perhaps my favourite coral, and the most aggravatingly difficult to acquire. Extraordinarily abundant, extraordinarily hardy, WILL grow in a tank under standard SPS conditions. But since it's Carribean ... simply not available hardly ever.

But please do enjoy the video, if you have not seen it already, you should.

http://reeftools.com/news/the-living-mayan-rivera-reef/

lorenz0 · #2 01-06-2011, 12:07 PM

man I just got back from there monday night, really wish I was able to push a couple more dives in. Saw my first jaw fish in wild which was awesome

whatcaneyedo · #3 01-06-2011, 02:12 PM

I challenge the hearty part. I had one alongside various acropora, pocillopora, hydnophora, and montipora colonies for just over a year. It grew only about an inch and then died. I'm not sure if it was insufficent flow or feeding or a combination of the two. I have however had a Pseudopterogorgia for over two years now without issue.

Delphinus · #4 01-06-2011, 04:28 PM

Well they're not hearty. Hearty is a term used to describe soup.

(sorry, had to become the grammar gendarme, but that one is a pet peeve. "Hardy" != "Hearty").

I had one for about 4 years, doubled in size. Only lost it this year due to a combination of tank troubles, and overstocking decisions on my part, and the fact that all the LFS's in my area suddenly decided to stop stocking frozen Cyclops-eeze which was the food that was working for me with this coral. I went through several other coral foods even some that had Cyclops-eeze as ingredients but they did not produce the same feeding response that pure frozen Cyclops-eeze had done. Eventually it stalled and eventually withered. But I had a pretty wicked run with it until things went wrong.

The "secret" I've found with gorgonians:
- solid base is a must. There cannot be any movement of the base of the coral or even the rock it is on. Ie., must be cemented firmly in place to the point it is a massive ordeal if you want to move it.
- good lighting, good flow, etc. etc. we all know this one
- finding the right food, even photosynthetic gorgs benefit from feeding. I actually lost several photosynthetic gorgonians in the dry spell that I couldn't obtain frozen Cyclops-eeze. Amazing to me how dependent they all got to the one specific food that was working.

Seriously though, I noticed a HUGE difference in growth rates of gorgs - be it purple ribbon, purple plume, rhumphella, corky fingers and others .. between just having them glued to a piece of rubble versus glueing them to a >2lb solid rock that had no wiggle to it whatsoever. I think this is key with gorgs.

whatcaneyedo · #5 01-07-2011, 12:19 AM

My spelling/grammar isn't great at the best of times and 7:00am certainly isn't one of them. Thanks for the clarification though.

I occasionally fed freeze dried Cyclops-eeze but maybe that form isn't good enough or I didn't feed it often enough. Its too bad, I was really hoping to be successful as I wanted to share them around as frags since they're so hard to come by.

Delphinus · #6 01-07-2011, 01:25 AM

Yeah, I hear ya. FWIW, I've found that neither the flake and the freezedried version of Cyclops compared to the frozen. The only problem with the frozen was you had to buy this enormous brick of it that would last 18 months if you only fed it a 1/2" square at a time 2-3x per week. Luckily now you can get it in about the size of a chocolate bar which is a little more convenient but a little more expensive.