Shrinking Shrooms and Xenia

[ChazYork]

ok, for the past two days i've watched my xenia wittle down to 0.5inch stalks and they do have their arms out but not fully stretched and they are NOT scrunched up like they do with a hermit picks at them..they were about 5 inches tall and spread out pulsing in the current two days ago - also my shroom colony has about shriveled up to nothing over the last two days, i did PWC to try to get them back and my water parameters are all good - NH4 0, PO4 0, NO3 less than 5ppm, sg 1.025, pH 8.4....i have absolutely no clue what is happening.

my fish are well, i have yellow button polyps that are flourishing, my purple gorgonian is growing and sand polyps are spreading...the only new addition to the tank over the last 4 months has been 2 lettuce nudibranches which i put in about a week ago... anyone please help. TIA im afraid that i will be losing some of my corals

 

[pluk1992]

My xenia's have done that same thing about 2 month's ago. THey have remained that size since. I do not know what may be causeing this. But my mushroom's did that to and, i stuck with them even though I thought they were dying. In about a week i had new shroom's. I think that's how the reproduce.So stick with and watch your water chemistry closely and maybe you'll get some more shroom's

 

[ChazYork]

Come on...nobody else has anything to say to help me? The xenia and shrooms have been in my tank the longest too even, for about 7 months now...hope that helps!

 

[zenn]

my xenia was acting wierd too recently. It sort of shriveled up a bit. I too haven't found the reason for this. I was pretty worried at first because when xenia dies it takes everything with it.

My suggestion would be to really watch it close. Do more water changes and just watch it. One cause might be insufficient iodine. You have to be careful when dosing iodine though because you can easily kill things with it, so testing is required if you dose more than just a couple times.

 

[melosu58]

Never had xenia`s but I raised over a hundred mushrooms from 4 in just over 2 years. They are pretty indestuctable. They are not near the lights are they as mine thrive on the bottom. I also added Kent`s Coral accel to my tank 2-3 times a week. It says every day but I always under dose. Like I said I went from 4 to over 100 in 8 different places. I`m sure PWC every week helped also.

 

[Brenden]

Have you changed salt or adding anything to your tank? How often are you doing WC's? Can you get your SW checked for iodine?

 

[bubblegirl420]

Maybe this has no relevance whatsoever, but if it works for us it might work for you too. Our mushrooms were shriveling right after we added salt to our tank. Our Ph was way off and so was our calcium. We finally got the levels right and now our mushrooms are reproducing. So, anyway, sorry if I wasn't much help. Hope you find your answer!

 

[ChazYork]

I've been doing the same thing for 6 months now, a 10 gal PWC every week the exact way...same amount of salt to water ratio. I've been using Purple Up for a few months now, and every 3 days i add a drop full of Marine Snow...there are a few stalks of xenia that have started to SLOWLY grow back but i think i may lose the one colony, however my shrooms are doing well again, they seem bigger. So my only concern is the xenia, is it true it can take out a tank when it dies?

 

[austinsdad]

is it true it can take out a tank when it dies?

It has also been reported to act like the "Pheonix" and rise from the dead after crashing. I had a crash and it wiped out my coral (except shrooms) and inverts, but I had a HUGE amount of it growing in my tank in 2 varieties. How much is in your tank?

Got anything else in the tank sucking up iodine? How long didja have the xenia doing well before it started acting weird.

BTW, xenia ia a very weird coral IMHO. I've known folks with almost perfect water that couldn't grow xenia.