Oh no!!! My poor urchin!

S

satyra

We have a black urchin that came in on some lr in my smaller reef tank, I think he's a pincushion. Any how, he's never given me any probs but just now I found him and it looks like he was I'm an accident! It looks like a ton of his spines were broken off somehow. My water parameters have not changed at all, ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and phosphate are all undetectable, kh is 7, ph is 8.1 and temp at 78. All the corals and fish look normal as usua, I cant think of anything that would make this happen except maybe he squeezed into a really right space and had trouble getting out :( he looks pitiful without all those spines but he's still roaming around like he normally does...any one else have any ideas?
 
Just the occelaris and a coral beauty, and the corals. If he moves into a good spot I'll snap a quick pic of him. It kinda looks like something fell on him, but none of the lr has budged...? Doesn't look like any of his actual body is damaged, you think he has a good chance of healing up quickly?
 
sg is at 1.026, sorry forgot about that earlier. I do keep it topped off cause I hate seeing the water line below the rim. Man I hope he'll be fine :( he's so cute and he hasn't touched the corals, model citizen.
 
I have a black longspine urchin that's been going through something similar for the last few weeks. Looks like he suddenly got a haircut all over. I'd always read they're pretty much goners if they drop their spines all at once because it's an indiciation of some major stress and they basically have open wounds whereever the spines, which leaves them very prone to infection. But but mine has been like this for about a month now and is active as ever. Hopefully both our guys pull through.
 
Sorry to hear about your little guy! I hope ours both recover. I'm not so confident that mine will though. He's lost more spines and looks like he's having a hard time moving around. I've been feeding him, not sure if he's actually eating any of it, I think he might have liked the squid I gave him. Only good thing is looks like some of the spines that came off first might be healing, theyre turning black (where the spines have just come off, it looks like white exposed flesh :() and the area where the spines come out are looking "knobby".
 
@simontan wrote:
I have a black longspine urchin that's been going through something similar for the last few weeks. Looks like he suddenly got a haircut all over. I'd always read they're pretty much goners if they drop their spines all at once because it's an indiciation of some major stress and they basically have open wounds whereever the spines said:
Yep, sad to say, once they drop their spines they don't have much longer. Doesn't necessarily have to be major stress, starvation will do it too.
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