Mushroom or Elephant

[AhwaGirl]

New here and need help! I found an article about various mushrooms and it led me here. I hope it's okay to just jump in and ask a question.

So I picked up two mushrooms at the LFS yesterday. One is definitely a mushroom. I've had them before.

The other (a pair) didn't look quite the same, but the rock they are on is gorgeous with ton of corraline so I bought it. It's been a while since I read up on mushrooms so I pulled out my invert books. Of course, that's when I read about elephant corals and how they eat fish. Now these two (that don't look like the smooth-surfaced single frag I bought), are still small (about 2 inch across) but as I mentioned look different from the other single guy. They are green with spots sort of. I figured I'd wait and see if they grew (having read that elephants get huge) and if it did, I'd get rid of them then.... take back to LFS.

Well, today (just brought them home yesterday) my pencil urchin is over on the rock (lots of yummy corraline, I'm sure) and one of her pencils gets in the green/spotty "mushroom." The next thing I know it's curled up and rather gooey looking. Her pencil seemed stuck in glue-like substance. I couldn't tell if she was attacking it and the polyp was protecting itself or if it was trying to attack the pencil. So I moved her.

Here is a pic. The disc in the background is how they normally look.... the one in the foreground is the gooey look a minute or so after the "attack" (but now it's back to normal).

So.... are these elephants? If so, should I get them out of my nano NOW before they munch my clown fish? Or do some variations of mushrooms react this way when touched by another critter, but are harmless.

Help!!

TIA!
Jill in Phx

P.S. Talking about the difference between a discosoma/actinodiscus vs. amplexidiscus fenestrafer.... I'm worried about the safety of my clown fish....

 

[Anonymous]

It's hard to tell from that picture. Is there any way you could get a clearer picture?

 

[AhwaGirl]

It's hard to tell from that picture. Is there any way you could get a clearer picture?

I will definitely try today, Tom. But do regular discosoma get all gooey when touched by another animal? That's why that picture was key. The one in the back was "normal" and the one in the front had just gotten all glue like and curled up around one of my pencil urchin's pencil.

I will try to get a better shot today of them in their relaxed state. Thankfully it's only happened once. And these two critters are only about 2 inches across right now.

 

[Anonymous]

Ricordias and shrooms both will slime, yes..

 

[AhwaGirl]

Ricordias and shrooms both will slime, yes..

But do these look like the non-deadly shrooms or the kind that will eat my fish!! 8O

Here is another pic of them in their mellow state....

 

[AhwaGirl]

You may have to scroll to see the mushrooms in the pic.

 

[Anonymous]

Those look like Rhodactis to me, not elephant ear coral. But, I warn you, I'm not an expert!

 

[AhwaGirl]

Here is what I read about these, then:

"Large species of Rhodactis can trap fishes, in the same manner as the related genus Amplexidiscus"

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/ ... invert.htm

Then on another website I was told this:

"Amplexidiscus has a very distinct band around the outer rim." So we no it's not an elephant, but if it's a Rhodactis what is considered large and fish eating??

 

[AhwaGirl]

This is exactly what the ooze looked like:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/c ... choata.JPG

 

[Anonymous]

The ooze looks like mesenterial filaments to me (part of the digestive system, IIRC, ejected at times of stress).

I'm sorry, I can't give you the definitive answer as to whether those shrooms are likely fish eaters. However, it sounds to me that you have reasonable doubt and it might be worth either banishing them to another tank without the clowns (if that's an option) or returning them to the seller/selling them on to someone who has a tank with few fish likely to sit on the shroom (i.e. a tank with active fish like tangs that don't settle).

 

[AhwaGirl]

Thanks, Tom! I think for now I'm just going to hang tight and keep an eye on things. As soon as the 56 gallon that we just got is done cycling we'll be giving everyone some additional room, so that should help too.

I appreciate the advice from everyone. We've had mostly a FOWLR tank so this was a completely new experience to me!! 8O