Mounting clams?

Gdbyrd

life's a beach
Or I guess I should say positioning of them. I got one saturday, I dug out a little hole for it. Set it in there and then moved the sand up around it.

It would kinda pulse and dig itself in a little more. After a few hours it had turned almost on its side. I keep straightening it out, but every day its always leaning one way or another.
I'm afraid messing with it everyday is going to hurt it. Anything else I can do? I thought about putting it on a little rock ledge, but when it pulses I'm worried it'll fall off.
 
I think I am going to try to move it up a little higher in the light. I didn't know they would move like that. Its turning towards the light. That ledge should work out better for it. I'm just worried about it kicking itself off and landing on its face when I just left for work. Which would suck, I work 10 to 12 hour shifts.
 
What kind of clam is it? Some are rock borers and should be kept on rock.

Got Tridacna art
Tridacna crocea - Middle to high up in your rockwork depending on color intensity of mantle.
Tridacna maxima - Middle to high up in your rockwork depending on color intensity of mantle.
Tridacna derasa - Place on small piece of rock for ease of movement if needed. Do not place directly in sand- clam will blow away sand and attach to glass on bottom.
Tridacna squamosa - Place on small piece of rock for ease of movement if needed. Do not place directly in sand- clam will blow away sand and attach to glass on bottom.
Tridacna gigas - Place on small piece of rock for ease of movement if needed. Do not place directly in sand- clam will blow away sand and attach to glass on bottom.
 
Pretty sure its a maxima. The mantle is blue to purple, the shell is really rough feeling too. I haven't had a chance to do any research on him yet, had a really rough week so just going off of what the lfs said. He told me to place it in the sand.

Any more info I can give I will. There is a picture of it in my tank showcase, would link to here but can't with my phone. Title of the thread is "my glass doghouse."
 
Mine wouldn't stay on the rockwork. He was like "eff-you, man! I want to be on the sand!" So that's where he's been. :-|
 
Pretty sure its a maxima.
Going by the pic in your other thread, thats a crocea. Get that up on the rock at least 1/2 way up or higher. They like lots of light and won't get it at the bottom of your tank. A squamosa would do fine at the bottom, but your tank is too small for that clam. They get huge.
 
Crap. Thank you Capt. Appreciate the look see. What do you think I should do with it then? How long does it take to grow? Maybe it'll work out if its slow. Could be a great excuse to upgrade to a bigger tank later.

Would it do ok at the top of the tank? Do you need to acclimate them like corals?
 
Yeah,you'll have to acclimate it to your light,just like corals.
BTW
any excuse to up grade,is a good thing:D
 
You should try to move it up, a little at a time to light acclimate it. Looks like you have some ledges where you can put the clam. Crocea's don't get real big and they are slow growers.
A squamosa doesn't need anywhere near as much light as a crocea or maxima, but gets way bigger and they grow pretty fast. If you got a small (3") squamosa and put it at the bottom of your tank, I would say in 2-3 yrs it would be too big.

Here's an older pic of my maxima. It's about 6" now. I got it about 5 yrs ago and it was about 2.5". They are slow growers like croceas.
top-maxima_4-09.jpg
 
Beautiful clam. Yote! Man, I had a 135 gallon tank I got for 100 bucks, like a year old and my wife made me sell it. She said it was too big for my man cave. I told her we should just move.

Sigh. Well, I will start moving it up this afternoon. I'm assuming I can move it all the way to the top of the tank? Going to place it where my zoas are for now. But there is a great ledge up on the top.
 
Beautiful clam. Yote! Man, I had a 135 gallon tank I got for 100 bucks, like a year old and my wife made me sell it. She said it was too big for my man cave. I told her we should just move.

Sigh. Well, I will start moving it up this afternoon. I'm assuming I can move it all the way to the top of the tank? Going to place it where my zoas are for now. But there is a great ledge up on the top.

Here honey, this room is all yours you can do what ever you want to it. Just dont do this, I dont think it will go good in there. :grumble: Sounds about right:mrgreen:

I would really like to get a clam but never had the guts to get one. How hard are they to keep? Just wondering

Brian
 
If you do want to keep it on the sand, you'll need to bury a rock underneath it for it to anchor itself. If it only has sand underneath it, it will keep falling over.
 
I went ahead and moved him up on a little ledge that my zoas were on.

Seen here: Do you think this is high enough? It gets plenty of flow there. I dropped the zoas a little lower. Hope they don't mind.

JakeJaxCorals013.jpg
 
It's 31" tall total. Thanks for getting back to me on that PM Capt. I'm going to slowly keep working it all the way up to the top and hopefully it'll do better. I'm tempted to move it up closer to the top right now, but it's only been 1 day since I last moved it.
 
I went ahead and moved him to the top of the tank yesterday. I had trouble finding a place for him to acclimate so I've been cutting back on my lights.

The damn thing won't stay though. It keeps falling off the top of the rock. I have two relatively flat spaces and yesterday morning and this morning I have found him face up in the sandbed.
So, what do I do? I'm starting to lose sleep over it, lol.
 
Did you try adjusting the postion of your powerheads to change the flow pattern? They will move if they don't like the light or the flow where they are. It should get just enough flow so the mantle slightly ripples. You don't want so much that the mantle folds over on itself, but not to little either so the clam can't filter enough water to eat and breathe.
 
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