mushrooms?

[segraves1]

Mushrooms go in the coral catigory right (if not, move it/let me know)?

Anyways, my question is what does it take to "grow" mushrooms? They don't need much light do they? Are they filter feeders? Info....can't find much......

thanks

[zoo-a-holic]

the are a filter feeder, howver, you can spot feed them once they are a little bigger. the lighting thing all depends on the mushroom. are you looking to go with ricordia or anything like that????

[segraves1]

I have no idea what I really want (as in which species).....I'm still reading and looking around......just trying to find something that isn't too difficult/touchy till I get used to things........

[Reef_Angel]

Mushrooms do tend to like the lower lying areas of the tank. Mushrooms that actually don't let go and disappear mysteriously into your reef, tend to prefer be in a "shadowey" area of the tank. If they are put up high near the intense lighting of the tank, they will detach themselves and go find a place that makes them happy.
Glueing is futile as they just slime themselves off the glue. Your best bet is to put them in a container (I usually use the bottom half of a 1 liter bottle). Put some gravel or small pieces of live rock in the bottom, put the mushrooms you want to attach in the container, cover it with some fine fabric like bridal veil material from any craft store, and then put it back in your tank. Put them in the same place you intend to place them when they are ready. Don't move them around much while you're waiting for them to grab some gravel, or you'll just delay the attachment process! Give them a good week or more. Check them but be careful not to disturb them to much. Afterall, they're not going anywhere at the moment. Once they have a nice pad of gravel attached to them, then you can glue them to a specific place that you have in mind. Use the glue sparingly on the shroom's gravel or they'll just let go of the gravel. They don't like glue on them at all!! You can also just set them with their pad of gravel where you want, and they'll take it from there. Low flow areas are generally where mine are happy, and of course as I mentioned before, they prefer lower lighting. Mine love the corners of the tank near a grouping of rocks. As for feeding them, they are filter feeder. They live off the foods in your water column from all you feed your other inhabitants, Some will actually eat brine shrimp. Using a product with phytoplankton such as "brand name: DT's". Pretty simple once you get them to sit still and grow where you want them. Good luck!

[segraves1]

mushrooms sound exactly like what I'm looking for now........low light (low cost) and low work.....

[tigersax7]

true they generaly like low light....but as mentioned there are several kinds of what people consider mushrooms... there are the rhodactis (these can as get big as 12" across)...Actinodiscus (these are generaly the smaller low light type that at most get to be 2-3" across, among these you get the striped mushrooms spotted and metalic blue)...And then there are my favrite type called Ricordea (these get to be 2-3" across and there are two kinds, ricordea florida and ricordea yuma) florida's are pretty easy to keep and the yumas are a lot more delicate but both need moderate lighting (some will prefer high light)...thoses are the common types of mushrooms you have to chose from...if you have low lighting stick to the Actinodiscus varity as they are the easiest to care for, andI would advise you stay away from rhodactis if you have a small tank/low lightor keep small fish (rhodactis will eat small fish). Hope this helped....happy reefing

tigersax7

[segraves1]

what I have is:
a 10gal tank
~10lbs of live rock
~15lbs of crushed coral
~60watts of NO Florescent (18" bulbs....2 50/50s and 2 full spectrums)
a 300gph hang-on bio-wheel filter (with the bio-wheels removed)
and a pair of juvenile percula clowns.....

based on that, what should I do?

[tigersax7]

hmmm....thats a tough one...your two percs will quickly out grow that set up...your lighting would be more then adiquite for a tank that size but the problem of toxic build up may hinder you ability to have coral...also a nano tank tends to require far greater vigilance when it comes to house keeping chores then larger tanks do you will need to do frequent water changes (1-2 gallons weekly)and with that much lighting over the nano you will have to top it off with fresh water daily to prevent the salinity from climbing to high. With this in mind you might be able to get away with haveing few of the more hearty corals like mushroom and maby somezoa's but you will have to be carefull not to over loads the system or it can crash killing every thing. If you to upgrade you tank to a 20 long you would find you will have better luck the only thing that may prevent this is the lighting Im not sure what kind of setup you have so I dont know if if will fit well over the 20 long but on the plus side you pick up a 20 long for about $30 give or take a few. I hope this helps and good luck...

tigersax7

[segraves1]

I know the 10 gal is going to be quite difficult but I'm watching thing daily.......the lights are a home made light housing that I build out of wood and uses 4 18" florescent tubes, though when I get the money I'm going to replace a pair of the tubes with a 150wattdouble ended metal halide..... so the clowns will "outgrow" the 10? the local saltwater store has a black/white clown in a nano tank so I figured a pair would be ok in my 10 (though I could be wrong).....

when you say "crash" the system (I read about this happening a lot), what exactly causes this "crash"?

[tigersax7]

the clowns will grow to be 3-4 inches in length, while they are young they should be ok but they will grow....a crash is basicaly a chemical over load, usualy involving toxic levels of amonia that will cause things to start die. As new things die and decaythey will contribute to the already toxic amonia levels, thus creating a chain reaction killing every thing even the live rock... a metal halyide over a 10 gallon seems a bit exsesive keep ion mind the heat generated from this will cause huge evaporation problems, Ive heard storys about people doing this and they have had to replace half their water volume withfresh daily...the choice of course is yours keep in mind there will be limitations to such a small tank.When yougo to up grade the lights you might want to drop another$30-40 to get a 20 long or a29 tall all of you equipment at that point should work well and it might giv you enough space that you can squeze you NO folescents under the hood with that Metal halyide. if you do this I would sudjest that you switch all the NO bulbs to atinic to complement the MH.hope this helps.

tigersax7