![]() They are very very tough and it will take a lot to make this polyp unhappy so they are ideal for newbies. So a nice spot either on the sand or the rock work that has a low/moderate flow where they won’t be battered and out of direct intense lighting would be perfect. If you treat them as you would pretty much any other mushroom polyp you can’t really go wrong. Ricordea florida do not like strong flow or strong light. Once you have picked your perfectly mounted, perfectly coloured, perfectly shaped polyp – where the heck are you supposed to put it? You also don’t want to pick one that has a gaping mouth (unless it has of course just had a poo in front of you – filthy buggers). When you are choosing your new polyp you want to pick one that has an intense colour and doesn’t look opaque or bleached as this is a sign of a stressed individual. So you won’t need to worry about how on earth you need to stick the little fella down and stop it floating away never to be seen again. Before our polyps leave the fish house they are mounted onto either frag plugs or our home made bases. Well if you are lucky enough to have a local fish store who stocks our polyps then half of the work will have been done for you. So now you know what they are, how on earth are you supposed to look after them and choose a healthy one? Only long term, low impact, sustainable collections in mind. This is why Ricordea florida are harder to find in nicer colours in areas that are easy to collect from, because as a species us humans can be pretty lazy, I mean we’d rather be back on the beach with a beer, right? What is special about our polyps is that only the very largest ones are harvested, leaving the rest of the colony to grow on allowing for future collections time after time. The Caribbean, especially those that are showing up in our market at the moment from Cuba for example are large colonies on large pieces of reef rock.Įven with collection quota in place it would still be easy enough for a collector to find a good patch of Ricordea florida and harvest the whole lot from a single area in one go. This is one of the main ways that helps tell the difference between a polyp that has been collected from the Atlantic and the Caribbean. By law it is required that they are harvested with a flexible blade no wider than 2 inches and that they are attached to chippings of rock no larger than a couple of centimeters. In the case of Ricordea florida that number is either 100 a day per individual (with the appropriate license) or 200 a day per vessel. It is this agency that is in charge of managing fish, wildlife and natural habitats and their mission is ‘working with others to conserve, protect and enhance fish, wildlife, plants and their habitats for the continuing benefit of the American people’.Īs part of this mission they enforce collection restrictions for most species collected from the Atlantic to avoid exploitation. The United States have an agency within their federal government called the Fish and Wildlife Service. They are collected in both the Caribbean and the Atlantic however we only purchase Atlantic Ricordea florida. In a nutshell they are a type of anemone that come from the family Ricordeidae. They will often look wonderful under actinic lighting.So, what is a Ricordea florida I hear you say? Usually, the Ricordea Mushroom will ship as several polyps attached to the same piece of live rock – if any of the mushroom polyps become disattached, please attach back to the rock as they are still alive. ![]() ![]() You will not need to feed the Ricordea Mushroom anything in particular as they receive most of their nutrients through the photosynthetic ability of micro zooxanthellae that inhabit the coral. ![]() In caring for the Ricordea Mushroom, it is necessary to have the proper tank specifications: low waterflow is best with moderate to high lighting levels as well as a bottom placement in the tank. This particular specimen is more wholly colored in reds and oranges making it quite a spectacular specimen to behold in a reef tank. They are also commonly known as Flower Mushroom Corals due to their beautiful colorations in greens, reds, oranges, and pinks. The Ricordea Mushroom, Ricordea sp., is a species of mushroom coral that is an excellent mushroom for beginner aquarists as it is easy to care for and raise in a home aquarium. ![]()
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