Are these aiptasia's ?

[Blue Deuce]

I could write a book about fish keeping only. This is unchartered waters though. I have a few of these and figured it is best to get rid of them sooner then later if they in fact are.

[Buster4900]

Not sure what they are, but not aptisa. MAybe some type of anemone?

[Randall_James]

look like cup corals, sorry I do not have sp for you, did you just get new live rock? These are reef safe btw...

[Paintbug]

those are cup corals. http://www.melevsreef.com/id/stony_polyp.html

[Blue Deuce]

Thanks all for the help. I can breathe easier now.

They came from Tampa bay saltwater. The link Paintbug sent me said they don't live long in captivity. I bought a lot of live rock from them 5 years ago. This little piece had fallen behind a big piece and never saw them until I started taking some of the rock out to seed my new 72. I must have good water. I have not changed a drop in 4 years and every fish survived 11 days w/o electricity when hurricane Charley came through.

[Randall_James]

TBS has a critter list you can look at....

There are in fact exceptions to many practices and norms in this hobby. Not changing water is typically a fatal move to anyone with tanks of SPS corals and other sensitive livestock. There are "occasional" tanks that do not get water changes that survive like this.

Are they thriving? hard to say, but the numbers of tanks that crash in this condition probably outnumber the ones with regular water changes.

Not sure that I agree with husbandry practices that do not include accepted norms of water changes as I do not think it provides optimal habitat for the fish and/or corals.

A tank that survives 11 days without power is also exceptional, perhaps extremely low bio load/ extremely good photosynthesis, maybe just really lucky..

knock on wood and consider yourself lucky I suppose...

[Blue Deuce]

Originally posted by Randall_James

There are in fact exceptions to many practices and norms in this hobby. Not changing water is typically a fatal move to anyone with tanks of SPS corals and other sensitive livestock. There are "occasional" tanks that do not get water changes that survive like this.

Are they thriving? hard to say, but the numbers of tanks that crash in this condition probably outnumber the ones with regular water changes.

Not sure that I agree with husbandry practices that do not include accepted norms of water changes as I do not think it provides optimal habitat for the fish and/or corals.

A tank that survives 11 days without power is also exceptional, perhaps extremely low bio load/ extremely good photosynthesis, maybe just really lucky..

knock on wood and consider yourself lucky I suppose...

I won't debate the merits of frequent water changes in reef tanks. I think they are essential to replacing vital trace elements and plan to be dilligent in doing them. However I think people tend to try to complicate this hobby wether its a fish only or advanced reef. Fish and reef keeping is akin to my passion which is photography. Put a disposable camera in Ansel Adams hands and he will still take a better photo then some newb with the latest dslr and excellent glass. I think alot of it is perpetuated by the mfgs. of equipment to generate sales. My goal has always been to keep it as simple as possible through pure water to start with, proper filtration techniques, establishing a robust biological filter base and not overloading that base as well as gut instinct. My fish only approach probably wouldn't work for everyone but for me it has been successful. I have not had a fish die in over 6 years and when I started this in high school we had nothing but the basics to work with.

[sarduci]

Originally posted by Blue Deuce
My fish only approach probably wouldn't work for everyone but for me it has been successful.

I would think that 99% of the tanks on here are not fish only. FO tanks are completely different that reef or even reef with fish. Therefore I would agree with your statement that your way would not work for everyone. In fact, I would suggest that your way may only work for a hand full of people that frequent this site.