skinz78
10K Club member
ATTN all current and future clam keepers!!
Hello fellow reef enthusiasts. I check the clam forum almost daily and I try to throw in my $.02 and try to help others out. Please feel free to start a thread and post up any questions you may have and myself along with others will do our best to answer them.
I see a lot of posts asking for help on sick and dieing clams that don't list all info that is needed. There is back and fourth communication problem asking for info and wasting time while clams suffer and die. People need to know how important it is to post all water parameters, pic's of the problem clam, aquarium lighting, recent tank changes, and ALL tank inhabitants when asking for help. This speeds up the diagnosis and helps recovery times.
Here is a good link to recommended water parameters:
Water parameters
And ten important tests:
#1 Calcium 380-450 ppm
#2 Salinity 1.024-1.026
#3 Alkalinity 2.5-4 meq/L
7-11 dKH
125-200 ppm CaCO3 equivalents
#4 Ph 8.1-8.4
#5 Magnesium 1250-1350 ppm
#6 Temp 78-82 deg F
#7 Nitrates 0
#8 Nitrites 0
#9 Phosphate < 0.03 ppm
#10 Ammonia <0.1 ppm
Pictures can sometime be worth a thousand words. So if you can please please post them. If you need help doing so just ask and we'll gladly help.:bigsmile:
Also I think all clam keepers old and new present and future should read about keeping clams from one or even both of these fine books:
Giant clams in the sea and the aquarium by
James Fatherree
Giant Clams: A Comprehensive Guide to the Identification and Care of Tridacnid Clams by
Daniel Knop
Both books are about the same price of a small clam and I urge first time clam keepers to purchase one or the other and read it before buying their first clam. In the long run people could possibly help their clams thrive and save some money too.
More useful links:
Clam pic's and ID
This site doesn't really tell you much about Id'ing clams but it has lots of pictures of different types of clams. You will have to scroll down and click the picture link on the left side to see the pic's
click on the clam type to see pic's
click on clam type on left side of page for pic's
A Clam ID page that I wrote up.
https://www.reef2reef.com/forums/clams/55284-giant-clam-id.html
Clam feeding
It is my belief that if you have good strong lighting "IE Metal Halide, LED, Plazma, or VHO T5's with individual reflectors" and a good source of nitrogen and phosphorus "fish pee" and "fish poo" then you don't need to do any supplemental feeding for clams. Supplemental feeding clams when done wrong can clog their gills and possibly kill the clam.
In some instances where a tank has a low bio load I have taken phyto and added small amounts to the tank for the clams, does it help? I don't know but I have kept lots of clams in a larger tank with very few fish with no issues when doing this.
Basically clams and the bacteria in our live rock and sand beds compete pretty heavily for ammonia equally. Ammonia is preferred. The byproduct is then nitrite. Clams don't use this but the bacteria in the sand and rock does. And the byproduct from that is nitrate which is consumed by clams but not the bacteria
Will clams lower Nitrates and Ammonia? No, not unless you have a vast quantity of them.
Clam Acclimation
First start off by turning off all of your lighting. Float it in the bag for 15-20 min. Then I take the clam in the bag if the bag is big enough hold at least 1 liter of water and if it isn't I dump the clam and all the water into a big plastic cup. I then place it and bag/cup in a 5 gallon bucket. Then I have a 1/4" airline hose that is about 3-4 feet long. On one end of the hose I have tied a knot in it to restrict flow to a very slow drip. Place the hose into your tank and start a slow siphon into the bag or cup the clam is in. I then forget about the operation for about an hour letting the container overflow into the 5 gallon bucket. When the bag or cup is starting to float in the bucket I check the water temp and compare it to my tank temp. I also take a toothbrush and gently scrub the clams shell to knock off any unwanted hitchhikers. Sometimes re floating is necessary because the container water cools off again. Once I am sure the clam has been very slowly acclimated to the tank water temp and parameters I add it to the tank on the sand bottom.
After the clam has been in the tank for about an hour I slowly start to turn my lights on again. Leave the clam on the sand for a few days and when you place it there put something small and flat buried in the sand under it. The clam will attach to it. This step makes it easy to move the clam from spot to spot on your rock work later. After the clam has been there for a few days and it is one of the more light loving clams IE Crocea or maxima. I slowly start moving it up on to the rock work.
If it is a squamosa giga's or derasa and I like it to be on the sand, if the clam hasn't moved from where I placed it to begin with I just leave it alone. If it does move IE from side to side or turns I know it wants to be elsewhere and I move it to another spot until it sits in one space. The same go's for clams up on the rocks, if they move themselves I don't put them back to the same spot. They are moving for a reason.
Clam VS Fish
I once had one of the many problems in clam keeping happen to me. My false Percula clown got a little too friendly with my Crocea clam. The clam closed on the fish's head, and by the time I noticed them the fish was dead. I am guessing the fish died instantly by the looks of things. This usually kills both the fish and the clam. So I freaked, I tried turning the clam upside down to see if it would release the fish. I gave it about 30 min and nothing changed. So I then came up with my BBQ skewer idea. It looks gross and inhumane but it worked. Remember the fish was already dead.
I stuck the fork through the fish and propped them up so the clam was hanging by its own weight from the fish. Five minutes went by and the clam dropped free.
HTH,
Chris
Hello fellow reef enthusiasts. I check the clam forum almost daily and I try to throw in my $.02 and try to help others out. Please feel free to start a thread and post up any questions you may have and myself along with others will do our best to answer them.
I see a lot of posts asking for help on sick and dieing clams that don't list all info that is needed. There is back and fourth communication problem asking for info and wasting time while clams suffer and die. People need to know how important it is to post all water parameters, pic's of the problem clam, aquarium lighting, recent tank changes, and ALL tank inhabitants when asking for help. This speeds up the diagnosis and helps recovery times.
Here is a good link to recommended water parameters:
Water parameters
And ten important tests:
#1 Calcium 380-450 ppm
#2 Salinity 1.024-1.026
#3 Alkalinity 2.5-4 meq/L
7-11 dKH
125-200 ppm CaCO3 equivalents
#4 Ph 8.1-8.4
#5 Magnesium 1250-1350 ppm
#6 Temp 78-82 deg F
#7 Nitrates 0
#8 Nitrites 0
#9 Phosphate < 0.03 ppm
#10 Ammonia <0.1 ppm
Pictures can sometime be worth a thousand words. So if you can please please post them. If you need help doing so just ask and we'll gladly help.:bigsmile:
Also I think all clam keepers old and new present and future should read about keeping clams from one or even both of these fine books:
Giant clams in the sea and the aquarium by
James Fatherree
Giant Clams: A Comprehensive Guide to the Identification and Care of Tridacnid Clams by
Daniel Knop
Both books are about the same price of a small clam and I urge first time clam keepers to purchase one or the other and read it before buying their first clam. In the long run people could possibly help their clams thrive and save some money too.
More useful links:
Clam pic's and ID
This site doesn't really tell you much about Id'ing clams but it has lots of pictures of different types of clams. You will have to scroll down and click the picture link on the left side to see the pic's
click on the clam type to see pic's
click on clam type on left side of page for pic's
A Clam ID page that I wrote up.
https://www.reef2reef.com/forums/clams/55284-giant-clam-id.html
Clam feeding
It is my belief that if you have good strong lighting "IE Metal Halide, LED, Plazma, or VHO T5's with individual reflectors" and a good source of nitrogen and phosphorus "fish pee" and "fish poo" then you don't need to do any supplemental feeding for clams. Supplemental feeding clams when done wrong can clog their gills and possibly kill the clam.
In some instances where a tank has a low bio load I have taken phyto and added small amounts to the tank for the clams, does it help? I don't know but I have kept lots of clams in a larger tank with very few fish with no issues when doing this.
Basically clams and the bacteria in our live rock and sand beds compete pretty heavily for ammonia equally. Ammonia is preferred. The byproduct is then nitrite. Clams don't use this but the bacteria in the sand and rock does. And the byproduct from that is nitrate which is consumed by clams but not the bacteria
Will clams lower Nitrates and Ammonia? No, not unless you have a vast quantity of them.
Clam Acclimation
First start off by turning off all of your lighting. Float it in the bag for 15-20 min. Then I take the clam in the bag if the bag is big enough hold at least 1 liter of water and if it isn't I dump the clam and all the water into a big plastic cup. I then place it and bag/cup in a 5 gallon bucket. Then I have a 1/4" airline hose that is about 3-4 feet long. On one end of the hose I have tied a knot in it to restrict flow to a very slow drip. Place the hose into your tank and start a slow siphon into the bag or cup the clam is in. I then forget about the operation for about an hour letting the container overflow into the 5 gallon bucket. When the bag or cup is starting to float in the bucket I check the water temp and compare it to my tank temp. I also take a toothbrush and gently scrub the clams shell to knock off any unwanted hitchhikers. Sometimes re floating is necessary because the container water cools off again. Once I am sure the clam has been very slowly acclimated to the tank water temp and parameters I add it to the tank on the sand bottom.
After the clam has been in the tank for about an hour I slowly start to turn my lights on again. Leave the clam on the sand for a few days and when you place it there put something small and flat buried in the sand under it. The clam will attach to it. This step makes it easy to move the clam from spot to spot on your rock work later. After the clam has been there for a few days and it is one of the more light loving clams IE Crocea or maxima. I slowly start moving it up on to the rock work.
If it is a squamosa giga's or derasa and I like it to be on the sand, if the clam hasn't moved from where I placed it to begin with I just leave it alone. If it does move IE from side to side or turns I know it wants to be elsewhere and I move it to another spot until it sits in one space. The same go's for clams up on the rocks, if they move themselves I don't put them back to the same spot. They are moving for a reason.
Clam VS Fish
I once had one of the many problems in clam keeping happen to me. My false Percula clown got a little too friendly with my Crocea clam. The clam closed on the fish's head, and by the time I noticed them the fish was dead. I am guessing the fish died instantly by the looks of things. This usually kills both the fish and the clam. So I freaked, I tried turning the clam upside down to see if it would release the fish. I gave it about 30 min and nothing changed. So I then came up with my BBQ skewer idea. It looks gross and inhumane but it worked. Remember the fish was already dead.
I stuck the fork through the fish and propped them up so the clam was hanging by its own weight from the fish. Five minutes went by and the clam dropped free.
HTH,
Chris
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