SOFT tube feather duster

great thx alot peredhil. now you and your duster cronies are givin me the itch to acquire one of these beauties. i curse you all. lol. nice pics and a great thread youve got goin here. now im off to my lfs, they are gettin a new shipment of corals in , and maybe just maybe theyve got a cool duster. cheers

 

the coco's, i believe, need to go on the rock. sand might be fine...

the soft tube ones will go in the substrate, but there are claims of them living on the rock too... or a combo half in sand, half on the rock.

My soft tubed has been moving a tiny bit each day... waiting to see where he ends up. But for now, he's only in the substrate.

And I am only guessing at gender of this thing - it's probably an it

I paid $12 for that one I've got.

I do not have a goby.

 

I love my feather dusters. They have made homes in the holes of my live rock. They look so pretty poking out of the rocks. I'll have to get some nice pics and show them. My clowns love one of the dusters. They agitated him to the point he popped off his bloom. He just grew a new one this week and is back out. I'll be adding more of these to my tank.

I did have one in the sand. Beware if you have hermit crabs. Mine cut it up and ate it!!! So now I put them up in the rocks. Sometimes I will spot feed them. I usually put the liquid snow in my tank and they do really good with that. I have them in med flow so they can collect all the food and nutrition they need.

 

its fine to have multiple dusters?

 

I believe so. I have two right now.

 

I have 2 feather dusters and 1 Coco worm. One of the feathers is real tiny and lives at the foot of my Leather coral. The Coco came out right between two mushroom's it is really cool. I love em they are so neat 24/7 I only bought one the rest are hitchhikers....
Danny

 

My goby does not bother the duster. neither do the crabs. I may just be lucky so far, sounds like some people have live stock bother them.

 

Okay several week's ago a teenager (friends kid) pulled the tube from around my hawiian feather duster. he went under a rock next to where he was setting and hid out for quite a while. He would stick a part of his crown out and I felt he wasnt getting proper feeding so I turned the rock over and he had covered himself in crushed coral with the sticky substance that he secret's (my spelling blows) from his body. I cleaned all the CC off and noticed he was tubeless except for about 1/4 of an inch. I have no fish or crabs so it was safe in the open. I propped him up on a rock and set for day's (I have no life) and watched him swell his body up I guess by taking in water. When his body was rather large he would shed that layer of skin and let it set and then when it got somewhat solid but not hard like a Coc worm would, he would expel the water and then wait till it got a bit solidified He would swell up again and use another layer of hide or skin to make another layer for his tube. He has a pretty long tube now and is looking better, so that tells me not only how he makes his tube but also indicates that phytoplankton is a good source of food for them. I(f it werent he would not have had what it takes to construct another tube for his protection. So any way that is the way it all look's to me. I watched him for day's and saw no other way for the tube to have been constructed, If there are any other idea's on how this is done I would love to hear it and am sure the thread maker would.nt mind as this thread has so far been to learn about these cool lil creatures.....
Danny

 

awesome thread!!!!

 

very neat story dude! 8);D that's interesting and from watching mine since the original tube broke off, this story really makes sense to what I've been seeing.

nice.