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Blue agaves


Jmvanness

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So I bought a frag with 2 polyps and a baby several months ago. I have never seen the polyps open, but there are about 5-6 polyps on the plug now. Is there a trick to making them happy? I've tried more/less flow, more/less light, and have moved it all over the tank. It's growing but not opening. Any suggestions?

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are the closed polyps fat and healthy looking or are they shrunk?

i've had some limited success in the past opening up closed zoas with furan 2 dip. i do a 1 hour dip in furan 2 dissolved in saltwater (1 satchet dissolved in 2 cups of tank water). i repeat it next day. if they seem to be responding i do a 3rd day, and then let it recover for a week. make sure to have the dipping cup floating in the tank or sump to make sure there is no temperature stress.

my theory is that the zoas are closed up because they are stressed for some reason. in this state, they are more susceptible to fungi that are normally present everywhere in the tank, and on the outer skin of healthy zoas. furan 2 is an anti-fungal.

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Are other zoas in the tank happy? Can you post a picture? Check for something causing them to close. I think its kind of crazy that they are producing more polyps but are never open. Do you have a shrimp running across them or something? Maybe there is a predetor eating them, like a nadibranc?

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The tank is almost completely zoas and palys. All the others are open and happy. Just the blue agaves won't open completely. I'm going to dip them with some coral dip I have and see if that helps. I'll post some pics in a bit.

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It looks like they are getting too much light. Mine do that sometimes when they are acclimating to my kessils.

Are they new arrivals, what kind of lights did they come from?

I would move them in less light for the time being and leave them alone.

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I would put them in the front corner of your tank. Welcome to PE's lol. Some of them are finicky. Especially the agaves and seductions. It took me a hot minute to find a happy spot for my seductions. Now they never close.

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And keep in mind ymwv. When I have zoos acting up first step is decrease light, increase flow, make sure nothing is irritating them. Some zoas are just destined to die unfortunately. But if your planning on getting hundreds of different kinds of zoas like some people here an acrylic frag rack and a spare Jebao wp10 are the best things you can buy.

The miracle flow has worked for me in the past as well. Sometimes once you get them open and going they will be fine forever. Some zoas need constant attention. We refer to these as Bitc**y zoas. Some zoas just won't stay doing good no matter how hard you try.

Here is the article from planet zoa on the miracle flow method.

http://www.planetzoa.com/blogs/tip-of-the-day/11191961-the-ailing-paly-part-one-miracle-flo-method

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Here is part 2 that talks about common zoa diseases. http://www.planetzoa.com/blogs/tip-of-the-day/11192013-the-ailing-paly-pt-2-disease-id-and-treatment While they don't advocate doing a lugols dip a lot of us zoa heads do. I know esacjack does as well. We dip everything that hits our tanks with flatworm exit. 1 drop in the bag that they came in for 15 minutes and then take just the frag out and combine frags into a Tupperware of your tank water and then into lugols. Generally about 5 drops in 8 ounces and then use turkey Baster to really make sure it gets in between the polyps for another 15 minutes. If I have zoas that are sick my first line of defense dipping wise is to lugols dip and see what comes off pest wise. Then I will go to Furan2, revive or coralrx as needed on the second day. Be forewarned though some zoas hate lugols dip and may close for a couple days and it will stain them just a bit. Pink ladies are the only ones off the top of my head that won't tolerate a lugols dip at all.

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