Please help with my cup pagoda coral

[ShelleyBoston]

Why would my clown fish be picking on my pagoda coral?they seem to be eating the polyps. I had the coral for over a year and they never picked it, it was healthy and today i noticed some polyps were empty as you can see in the picture in the middle lower section of the coral and I see both my clown fish picking at it, is the coral pretty much dead? anything I can do to stop them?
Help , don't want to lose the coral.
Thanks

Michelle

 

[fanaglethebagle]

They are trying to host it i guess

 

[Scott G]

yea i agree, they are probably rubbing against it and irratating it

 

[smcnally]

Are you sure the polyps were ripped out? They just look closed up. Your pagoda looks far from dead to me...It is still nice and fleshy. The clowns are probably hosting it and suckling on the polyps which would cause them to close. I've never seen them suckle on a pagoda, but they do on anemones.

 

[Casino]

If that coral is anything like a flower pot, it will die. Flower pots dont like it when clowns try to host it. This coral might not like it either. Unless you can tell your clowns to stop hosting it, im sorry but it wont last long. Try to move it and maybe they will leave it alone.

 

[ShelleyBoston]

yeah the polyps are empty and I can see this hair like stuff coming out of the empty holes as if they sucked out whatever was in it the inside of the polyps? so weird never seen them do this before. I just removed it and placed it in my sump for now until i figure it out what to do with it. It won't last long in my sump as I only have 36W of PC lighting..

 

[FinzAquatics]

why not move it to another spot in the tank, maybe clowns will leave it alone and it will revive. it will most definately die in sump. id say give it a chance to recover

 

[this is me]

Yup they're trying to host. My maroon clowns did the same thing to my goniopora. I ended up selling the pair of clowns I had.

 

[dz6t]

clown fish is known to suck on anemone's tenticles when it is hosting. In this case, the clown fish did not know what it was doing was killing the coral.

There are many examples about clownfish kill LPS when they were trying to host.

 

[smcnally]

If that coral is anything like a flower pot, it will die. Flower pots dont like it when clowns try to host it. This coral might not like it either. Unless you can tell your clowns to stop hosting it, im sorry but it wont last long. Try to move it and maybe they will leave it alone.

Pagodas are MUCH tougher than goniopora. The one I have went through a tank crash in before I got it. It was just about the only coral that survived.

 

[Rays]

I agree with Steve, it's got no chance in the sump, and it's very healthy looking. I would put it back in another spot, and I wouldn't be too concerned unless they start wearing the flesh away or continue stripping the polyps. BTW, here are my clowns in a goni, and the goni continued to throw off babies.

You can actually see a baby goni to the right.

 

[rjdudek]

Can you cover it for a few days with something like an eggcrate box?

 

[ShelleyBoston]

It seemed to have recovered in the sump, it looks healthy and all polyps are open. I will try placing it back in the tank tonight in a different spot and see what happens..

 

[ShelleyBoston]

Picture

Here is a picture I just took of the coral in its new spot in the tank (24Hrs later from the 1st set of pics)..

 

[willray]

I have a pair of clowns that have adopted a large pogoda 2 months ago.The first few days the coral was wityhdrawn.But now the coral looks better than ever.

 

[Rays]

Michelle that piece is gorgeous! Good luck.