Tank Journal Archive

[Clarityreef]

Let me start from the beginning...
The nudibranch:

I introduced a nudibranch to my tank during after moving everything over from the old tank and letting it settle.

Nudibranch was fine and happy and fat and a joy to watch. EXCEPT it liked to swiggle toward the outflow strainer on occasion. It got stuck once that I had to pull, yes pull!, it out of the strainer as it almost ready to be sucked in! Amazingly it survived and still swiggled around after being tugged. It was very squiggy...

1 month in, I went away on holiday for 5 days, everything was fine when I came back. Except no nudibranch :(
I suspected it has fallen to the deaths of the sump strainer

So to the current events, It been 1 month since having not seen the nudibranch. I was doing my weekly duty of cleaning and siphoning the dust out of the sump when I found:

----------------- A BABY NUDI-----------------

Its no bigger than 5-7mm, cant tell the colour. Is it possible that my nudi layed eggs somewhere before its timely death? or did it regenerate from a piece of its body like platyhelmithes? May there be a possibility or more nudi's in the sump?

This little thing is so cute! I have some small broken pieces of live rock in my sump, there may be some more hiding. I guess Im going to have to wait!

Weird... I did scratch my head after observing this tiny organism. :D

 

[MagicJ]

Interesting - any idea what species you had?

There is not a lot off information available on breeding the majority of nudibranch.

Berghia sp. appear to be quite easy, and you will find a fair bit about them as they are used for Aiptasia control - http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2004-01/ac/feature/

For other species, things are not quite so easy.

Not sure if all species are the same but it looks like they are hermaphrodites, although self fertilisation is rare. It also looks like they go through a veliger larval period where they float around in the plankton for a while prior to metamorphosing into the adult form. Feeding them during this period is often very difficult.

 

[Agent M]

It would be more likely that the baby nudi came in on a new coral - but you never know! If it looks identical as the one you added, I'd wonder, otherwise, probably just a hitch hiker.

 

[MQ-9]

I have had them lay eggs in tanks before. If you like Nudis i highly reccomend a snorkle in the moat at lennox head, if you are ever in the area, not unusual to see more than a dozen species. Nice sheltered snorkle too, very pleasant.

 

[dimitri]

I know this is an old post but:

nudibranchs have varying life cycles, some very fast, a few weeks to months and then they spawn and die.

Most seem to be about 1 year with the exception of a few that can go 4-6yrs

Also the cycle of there primary food source will have a direct coloration on their life span, birth > eat > reproduce > die > repeat

So you could have in your tank a continual cycle as long as they have a food source they are happy with.

That seems to be the tricky bit though they are notoriously fussy eaters.