Aquatic 2000 Blog

Unless your aquarium is outfitted with an air stone you should not see bubbles in the aquarium.  Water has probably evaporated from the system and it is important that it be refilled.  You should maintain a water level that is about half way up the filter at all times.  You can add purified water right to the filter.  If you have any questions just give us a call.

Your lights should be left on for no longer than 5-7 hours.  The longer the lights are left on the more algae you will grow.  If you’d like to watch your fish around the clock ask us about adding LED moon lighting to your lighting system.  This will give you a natural blue moonlight glow and the fish will appreciate a low ambient light.

A side note* If you have a reef system, your lights should be on for at least 6 hours and not longer than 9hours.  This should give the coral enough light energy to remain happy and healthy.

The thought of giving your fish a massage sounds downright kooky. But what about a little fish on fish massage? Still kooky, right? Maybe not. Researches in Sydney have found that a certain species of fish – the Surgeonfish in particular – can release stress by simply having physical contact alone. When scientists were first studying these fish, they thought that Cleaner Wrasses (a type of smaller fish) were simply having a free meal while they cleaned the debris off of the Surgeonfish’s skin. But what they discovered, was that the Cleaner Wrasses were actually lowering the stress level of the Surgeonfish by gently massaging them.

One of my favorite aquariums is my 10 gallon nano reef aquarium. It contains only corals, crustaceans, and other invertebrates, so it’s easier to keep clean. Some of the most interesting crustaceans in this tank are the sea star-eating shrimps: Harlequin shrimp Hymenocera elegans and Bumblebee shrimp Gnathophyllum americanum.

Bumblebee shrimp are a perfect livestock choice for a nano reef. They don’t eat corals, are safe for fish, and grow less than an inch long. When it comes to feeding, they are not as picky as Harlequin shrimp or Bongo shrimp. They are carnivores who love to eat the tube feet of echinoderms like sea stars and urchins, but will also eat some small bits of frozen mysis or Cyclop-Eeze. If you provide enough sea stars, they will easily survive the attentions of a pair of Bumblebee shrimp. It’s also a good idea to stock your nano with some Stomatella snails, as the Bumblebee shrimp snip pieces from the Stomatellas to eat without killing the snail. My Bumblebee shrimp is often seen harassing one of my many quickly-reproducing Stomatella snails.

Harlequin shrimp make are a great “showy” creature for a nano reef. Their beauty is surpassed by few other crustaceans. Harlequin shrimp are large enough that they are easy to spot, but small enough (only a couple inches) that they can be kept in a nano aquarium. They can be kept singly, but it’s much more interesting to keep a pair. They seem to use their giant, paddle-like chelipeds to communicate with one another, perhaps coordinating their sea star attacks.

It is very easy to sex Harlequin shrimp. Females have tiny, color-spotted swimmerettes on the underside of the tail. Males have a clear, colorless underside. Two males or two females should not be housed together, but males and females pair easily and without aggression.

Unlike the Bumblebee shrimp, Harlequin shrimp consume the whole star, not just the feet. They use their large front claws to pinch and pry the legs of sea stars from their substrate, then force the sea star onto its back where it is helpless. They can keep a sea star alive for long periods of time while feasting on them.

Harlequin shrimp only eat sea stars. They don’t eat brittle stars, however. The most readily available food sources for Harlequin shrimp are the tiny, hitchhiking Asterina stars, Chocolate Chip or African Knob, Linkia, Fromia, or Sand sifting stars. Linkia and Fromia stars are difficult to keep in captivity and more expensive. Remember, though, that the hardy, inexpensive Chocolate Chip and African Knob stars are not reef safe. It is possible to house a few Chocolate Chip stars separately from your nano aquarium and cut a leg off to feed the Harlequin shrimp, then allow the removed legs to grow back.

Hawaiian Harlequin shrimp are the most colorful, but they command pretty high prices and are more rare. The Indonesian variety is a little less expensive and may be purple, blue, or a combination.

Bongo shrimp are related to Harlequin shrimp, and eat both Sea Stars and Brittle stars. They are much smaller, growing to only an inch. They’re also much more rare and command a price between $100 – $130 a pair.

Here is a video by Liveaquaria.com of Bongo shrimp eating brittle stars.

UC Santa Barbara scientists have found an interesting case where herbivorous fish nurseries have helped severely damaged reefs recover from predation from crown-of-thorns sea stars, harsh cyclones, and other factors.

Published recently in PLoS ONE, researchers Thomas Adam, Russel Schmitt, and others found an interesting case when evaluating severely damaged coral reefs in the South Pacific in French Polynesia. The reefs fully recovered after being nearly destroyed by predators like the crown-of-thorns starfish or from cyclones. They wondered why this occurred as normally when a reef is decimated by similar forces (especially in the Caribbean), the affected reefs never really bounce back and remain heavily algal-covered.

What Adam and the other researchers found was that when these reefs in French Polynesia were destroyed, the herbivorous fish population exploded shortly thereafter. When surveying the surrounding fringing reefs, they found their answer.

The fringing reefs were the nursery grounds for many of local populations of fish, most notably surgeonfishes and parrotfishes which are herbivores. The heavy herbivore population helped keep the algal cover to a minimum which in turn helped the remaining coral recover.

“We discovered that these fringing reefs act as a nursery ground for baby fishes, most notably herbivorous fishes,” said Andrew Brooks, co-author of the paper. “With more food available in the form of algae, the survivorship of these baby parrotfishes and surgeonfishes increased, providing more individuals to help control the algae on the fore reef. In effect, the large numbers of parrotfishes and surgeonfishes are acting like thousands of fishy lawnmowers, keeping the algae cropped down to levels low enough that there is still space for new baby corals to settle onto the reef and begin to grow.”

This stands in stark contrast to the Caribbean where over-fishing has heavily impacted the herbivorous fish population. With low numbers of adult herbivores, Caribbean reefs struggle to recover.

This research should also be highly interesting to managers of Marine Protected Areas as well.  Their findings indicate that not only is it important to protect the reefs in general but also the fringing reefs that act as nurseries for the local fish population.

“Our new and very novel results suggest that it also is vital to protect the fringing reefs that serve as nursery grounds. Without these nursery grounds, populations of parrotfishes and surgeonfishes can’t respond to increasing amounts of algae on the reefs by outputting more baby herbivores.”