Koko worm....

[Mr-Moonlight]

Hi!

I have a red Koko worm... Had him a few weeks now and until this week
he has done fine... Now he doesnt seem to want to come out and when he
does he doesnt unfurl his feathered head fully... Any ideas?

I feed my corals marine snow once a week (only have 3 of them) and am
using instant ocean as my salt mix.. All tank perameters are rock
stable...

Thoughts anyone?

[kim gross]

Mr-Moonlight wrote:
> Hi!
>
> I have a red Koko worm... Had him a few weeks now and until this week
> he has done fine... Now he doesnt seem to want to come out and when he
> does he doesnt unfurl his feathered head fully... Any ideas?
>
> I feed my corals marine snow once a week (only have 3 of them) and am
> using instant ocean as my salt mix.. All tank perameters are rock
> stable...
>
> Thoughts anyone?
>

First you need to get some good food for your corals and the coco worm.
Depending on what corals you have some rotifers and some cyclopseez
would be a good starting point. the coco worm is a filter feeder and
will filter large photoplankton and small zooplankton out of the water.
YOu Marine snow has nether in it. Actually according to analysis of
it, it is more of a trace element additive than a food source.

Kim

[Mr-Moonlight]

Far be it for me, a biginner, to argue but acording to the ingredients
list it ONLY has plankton in it....? No trace elements at all... In
fact I was starting to wonder if it is the trace elements I was
forgetting....?

More thoughts?

[Tidepool Geek]

"Mr-Moonlight" > wrote in message
oups.com...
>
> I have a red Koko worm... Had him a few weeks now and until this week
> he has done fine... Now he doesnt seem to want to come out and when he
> does he doesnt unfurl his feathered head fully... Any ideas?
>
> I feed my corals marine snow once a week

Howdy,

The short answer is that your worm is almost certainly not 'equipped' to eat
the Marine Snow product and, as a result is reacting naturally to a
perceived lack of available food. Filter feeding worms sort what they eat
according to particle size. Most, or maybe all of these worms use a sort of
stepped U shaped feeding channel to select their dinner menu - the narrow
bottom portion of the channel transports food; the somewhat wider upper
portion transports building materials (for the tube); and anything too large
for one of those sections is discarded. In general the narrow 'food' section
of the channel is sized for phytoplankton while the wider part is often
moving marine snow which, like the commercial product, is an agglomeration
of mucus, bacteria, and other stuff.

Filter feeders in general and feather dusters in particular are taking a
risk by extending their feeding tentacles. When there isn't much food
available many of them will choose to retract and wait for the table to be
set.

There's an excellent article about this by Dr. Shimek at this URL:
http://www.dtplankton.com/feathers.htm

I suggest that you try a true phytoplankton product for a while to see if
the worm starts acting happier. Another consideration is feeding frequency.
Filter feeders are accustomed (in nature) to eating slowly and
semi-constantly. By feeding once or twice per week you're sending the worms
a confused message about the conditions in your tank. When there isn't
anything to eat for days on end the animal responds by going dormant. If
they are dormant or quasi-dormant when you feed then they won't be ready to
take full advantage of the opportunity. You're just about guaranteed to have
a happier worm if you spread your feeding out to at least a once per day
schedule. Two or three times per day would be even better and, if you feel
like doing some engineering, a constant drip would be the absolute best.

You may have noticed that the URL above is on the DT's website and DT's is a
highly regarded phytoplankton product. FWIW: I'm pretty sure that the DT's
folks are re-printing an existing article rather than the article having
been written as a sales tool. If the DT's product is prohibitively expensive
you may be able to get good results for less money with one of the
cryo-preserved phytoplankton products or you could also set up to culture
your own - A Google search on "phytoplankton culture" should give you scads
of information.

While we're talking Google, you might also want to search on "marine snow".
You'll find quite a lot of information about the natural substance, how it's
formed, and what eats it.


Planktonically yours,

TPG

[kim gross]

Mr-Moonlight wrote:
> Far be it for me, a biginner, to argue but acording to the ingredients
> list it ONLY has plankton in it....? No trace elements at all... In
> fact I was starting to wonder if it is the trace elements I was
> forgetting....?
>
> More thoughts?
>

I was trying to find the analysis of Marine Snow, but I can't now, the
only thing I can find is a link to the combisan analysis and a statement.

Dr. Shimek tested another TLF product at the same time: Marine Snow.
It was found to be more than 99% moisture


You can check here to see some interesting info on another TLF product
and how the label is a little different than what is actually in the bottle.

http://www.inlandreef.com/Testing/CSanalysis.

If you are looking for a good phytoplankton source look for DT's
photoplankton or the BIO-plankton from Liquid life USA.

Kim

[Mr-Moonlight]

Wow Thanks!

I'll try and search another product out... My other 'feather duster'
types are doing fine on the snow but it wont hurt for me to try
something else... Will I need to somehow get the Koko to realise that
food is there or will I just have to hope?

I have a protein skimmer on my tank too and I'm told that will deplete
the food naturally... If I devise a drop method for food addition how
much should it dispense?

Thanks again for your help...

Dan

[Tidepool Geek]

"Mr-Moonlight" > wrote in message
>
> I'll try and search another product out... My other 'feather duster'
> types are doing fine on the snow but it wont hurt for me to try
> something else... Will I need to somehow get the Koko to realise that
> food is there or will I just have to hope?
>
> I have a protein skimmer on my tank too and I'm told that will deplete
> the food naturally... If I devise a drop method for food addition how
> much should it dispense?
>
Hi Dan,

Sorry to take so long in responding. Quite frankly, I was hoping that
someone with more experience would jump in.

Here are some reasons to take what I say with a grain of salt:

A. I'm involved with a small public aquarium so my experience is with a
'flow through' system in which our filter feeders' needs are automatically
met by the plankton in the feed water. The bottom line is that I have no
first hand experience with commercial micro feeds be they phytoplankton,
zooplankton, or marine snow type products.

B. My interests are pretty focused on cold water systems and the keeping of
specimens that I can collect locally. My local waters have far more plankton
than do tropical waters and (I think) a far higher proportion of filter
feeding animals.

C. My own aquarium (still in the planning/dreaming stage) won't have a
skimmer and won't have particularly large pumping capacity compared to what
most reefkeepers use. My intent is to use an algal turf scrubber (small case
since I plan to DIY rather than buy an Algal Turf Scrubber) for nutrient
export and an array of the so called "broad flow" powerheads for water
movement. These are a bit more plankton friendly than the traditional
powerhead pumps.

Having established that I don't really know what I'm talking about, here are
a few thoughts on feeding plankton to your tank:

1. Go to this website and read every article that seems to relate to
plankton or filterfeeders - http://www.rshimek.com/reef/OnlineArticles.htm .
There are some fairly subtle issues involved with the care of filterfeeders
since different species sometimes use radically different strategies for
food collection. Shimek's articles will give you an excellent grounding in
the subject that will help you consider different products and methods.

2. The conventional wisdom on this newsgroup for dosing phytoplankton seems
to be to start slow and work up to whatever dosage is recommended by the
manufacturer. IOW: If the directions on the bottle indicate that you should
be dosing a half cup per day then you would be well advised to start out
with 2 to 4 tablespoons (1/4 to 1/2 dose) and work up to a full dose over
several weeks. Presumably, this strategy is intended to reduce waste and/or
excess nutrient pollution. Your worms and other filter feeders can handle
being underfed during such a short period of acclimation. [Here, in the
Pacific Northwest our filter feeders' diets are reduced by 90 to 95% from
late fall through early spring.]

3. If you have a skimmer, turn it off for a while after dosing any plankton
feed. Left on, the skimmer will remove a good deal of the plankton before
your animals get a shot at it. Most folks seem to recommend that the skimmer
be left off for an hour or two. I tend to think that longer would be better
from a feeding point of view but there are also issues of gas exchange and
the aquarists personal schedule to be considered.

4. There's also a good case to be made for shutting off any other pumps and
powerheads during plankton feeding since the high shear forces in the pump
can shred the plankton making it unrecognizable for many of the
filterfeeders. Always keep in mind that the term "filterfeeder" doesn't even
come close to describing the various systems used by these animals to
determine what they will have for dinner today.

5. As far as dosage is concerned, about the only things I can say are to
follow the directions on the bottle as a starting point, adjust the quantity
as necessary to find the point of maximum feeding without degrading your
water quality, and divide your daily feeding into as many small doses as you
conveniently can.

6. You shouldn't worry too much about your worms figuring out that the food
supply has gotten better. Assuming that he's otherwise healthy he'll notice
the extra food within a few days at most. [As an example, I was looking at a
colony of barnacles about three or four weeks ago. It was on an incoming
tide and they had been submerged for two or three hours. IOW: It was the
absolute best time for them to be feeding; yet they were completely sealed
up and inactive. The reason (I think) was that the plankton supply was just
about nil as is the norm around here in the winter. Since then spring has
sprung, the plankton supply has exploded, and those barnacles are in an
absolute feeding frenzy. When an intertidal barnacle is closed up he's
completely isolated from the outside - the mechanism is watertight yet they
managed to figure out that the table was finally set after the standard
winter famine.] If barnacles can do this then your worms, which don't have a
watertight seal, should have no problem.


Vermiculturally yours,

TPG

[Mr-Moonlight]

UPDATE!

Ok I started to feed daily on Friday... And I've seen an improvement
already... It has fanned out this weekend and has started growing a
second 'head'. I'm still feeding marine snow, for now, but have ordered
some cyclopseeze as one other poster suggested. I will have it mid week
and will start to alternate days and see how it goes...

Thanks for your help...

Dan

[Tidepool Geek]

"Mr-Moonlight" > wrote in message
>
> Ok I started to feed daily on Friday... And I've seen an improvement
> already... It has fanned out this weekend and has started growing a
> second 'head'. I'm still feeding marine snow, for now, but have ordered
> some cyclopseeze as one other poster suggested. I will have it mid week
> and will start to alternate days and see how it goes...
>
Hello again,

Glad to hear that things are looking up! I can only guess that some of the
Marine Snow is getting down into the food channel because of its gelatinous
nature. Once you've started dosing true phytoplankton you should see an even
happier population of worms.

If you're talking about the LiquidLife product "MarinePlankton with
Cyclopseeze" please be aware that the product is NOT recommended for true
filter feeders like your Koko worm. If I'm reading their website description
correctly, 'cyclopseeze' refers to some sort of copepod. Copepods are an
excellent food for lots of different animals; in fact, for animals that can
eat them efficiently copepods are arguably the most nutritious food on
earth. Unfortunately they're several times too big for your worm.

If you want to go with a LiquidLife product then a better option for your
worms would be their BioPlankton product which seems to be a frozen mix of
three different phytoplankton species.


Selectively yours,

TPG

[Mr-Moonlight]

Damn!

That is exactly the product I've ordered! Ok, dont panic! ;o)

So now what I really need is recomendations from other people with Koko
Worms...

What food do YOU feed your Koko Worm?

Dam