What's my Xenia doing?

[mvcg]

Hi All,
I have a little Xenia (Pulsing coral) colony. A couple of the larger specimens (3-4 inches in length) have started opening up on their sides. There is no slime and it doesn't look like an injury. It looks more like they're "folding open". I tried uploading a couple of photos but I couldn't figure out how. Anyway, anyone have any ideas? All other corals seem just fine and appear to be thriving.

Thanks,
-Mark

 

[mvcg]

I've uploaded the pictures to My Gallery if anyone would like to look at them.

Thanks for the great forum!
-Mark

 

[ReefLady]

I'll put the pics in the thread for you....

 

[Guest]

When mine do this, it is a sign of branching out... It could be something aggitating it also... I have noticed mine though, when it does this, it soon falls over and attaches it self and multiplies... I could be wrong and lucky, maybe someone else can shed some light on it...

 

[pipermurphy]

I agree, mine just did this and it spread out a little more on the rocks. Not to worry as you go these can grow big as my LFS has shown through time lapse pics of his in his 650 gal show tank.

 

[mvcg]

Well... they're still folding open. Wish us luck!

Thanks for the advice.

-Mark

 

[gooyferret]

Good luck. Got any frags to give me

 

[pipermurphy]

Well, what has happened to your xenia? any changes? growth

 

[mvcg]

Thanks for asking!

One of them bent all the way over and attached itself to the LR, via where it was "folding open". Now it's creating more little branches and spreading. This is so cool! When it grows a little more, I'll attach a picture or two.

Thanks,
-Mark

 

[thorn]

It's got to have spread out more by now! What's the story? Got any pics? I'm sure we'd all love to see it's progress.

 

[mvcg]

Hi All! The Xenia above was doing fantastic! It had split three times and was spreading out nicely. However, please note the word "was"...

About 6 weeks ago, after returning from work, I put my hand into the tank and the water was very cold. As a matter of fact, the digital thermometer said 69.1 degrees!! My heater had stopped working! I was able to replace it and get the temperature back up over a 4 hours period. The hammer, torch, trumpet, open brains, pagoda, and mushrooms have made it. The xenia is pretty much history. The xenia that once stretched out 3 inches or more is now a shriveled little 1/4 inch at best. They aren't dead, just not thriving. In the meantime, my torch and hammer corals are doing awesome. It appears that the hammer coral has new calcium growth!

Questions:
Any ideas how to bring the xenia back to their glory? Maybe just time?

Does anyone have experience using an uninterruptable power supply (UPS) to keep the heart of their reef system running in the event of a power outage? In my case, that's a 300W heater and a single powerhead. I'm thinking of getting a 1500VA UPS, but would like a general idea of how long it would keep those two items running (worse case scenario with the heater on 100% of the time. I can extrapolate after that).

Thanks for the great site!

-Mark

 

[cmor1701d]

The the product selector at APC's web site here.

Just total you load (watts) and enter how long you a run time you want. A 750 should give you about 5 hours. I have my heater, sump pump (Mag7) and powerheads (5) on a single 1000va ups. I haven't needed it for more than 10 minutes yet but I also have not calculated the total load yet either.