Say hello to my not so little friend... GIGAS CLAM

[JoshHill83]

I recently did something that most of my friends and family think is crazy- I picked up a gigas clam in the D.C. area and drove it straight back to Denver. I was lucky enough to be accompanied by a good friend of mine to tag team the drive, and we got him home in 26 hours. The pictures are from the first day I added him to my tank.

He’s actually much larger than I expected, and I was a little nervous about getting him in to my tank. He is approximately 26-28” long, and is a gorgeous purple with blue dots. I previously thought that my other clams were large, but this is a new level of madness for me. Enjoy the pics!

 

[zombie]

Holy $h!t that's a huge clam. I hope that's as big as he's gonna get. He barely fits as is.

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[halmus]

Holy cow! Any ideas on weight?

 

[zombie]

Holy cow! Any ideas on weight?

I'm gonna guess about 150 based on a rough volume comparison to the record size one. I'm interested as well to see how close my guess is.

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[JoshHill83]

I’m guessing he’s about 80 pounds. He has about 14” of water above him, and the tank is 4 feet front to back, so he should be good for 10-15 years in the current tank. If he grows faster than that I’ll need to either get a bigger tank or donate him to a public aquarium.

 

[JoshHill83]

We didn’t weigh him... we were too focused on getting him in the tank, but I don’t believe it’s over 100 lbs. He’s 13 years old.

 

[JoshHill83]

This is the tank it came out of:

 

[halmus]

You’re getting serious about the hobby when you have to install a gantry style hoist above your tank for livestock moves!

 

[jda123]

It is fantastic. What are you lighting it with?

 

[TheRealChrisBrown]

Don't clams use a lot of calcium? I'd be interested to see if your consumption changes drastically.

 

[SkyShark]

That is awesome!!! It’s a beauty too, the gigas clams aren’t always that nice looking.
What did you need to do life support wise to get it back? Air stones? Any pumps or heaters?
How’d you find the person selling(?) it?

 

[Balz3352]

Holy clam batman!

 

[JoshHill83]

I transported it back in a 55 gallon stock tank with a circulation pump and some air stones. I watched the temp and just adjusted the internal temp of the car to regulate it. It absorbs a ton of calcium and alkalinity. I will be testing my water twice daily for the foreseeable future until the apex trident comes out. I have t5s and LEDs above it. It came out of a tank with only t5s. I found the person on reef2reef. He had it listed for 3 years with multiple “still available” updates. I got a crazy good deal on it.

 

[JoshHill83]

I have a calcium reactor in case I don’t want to dose any more, otherwise I’ll be using the Apex DOS for calc and alk hourly dosing

 

[ReefCheif]

Hopefully that thing never tries to spawn, instant nuke. Beautiful specimen though.

 

[zombie]

Trident is still a ways out. The earliest it will possibly go into beta is next month, so I wouldn't expect a release until October at the earliest.

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[zombie]

Trident is still a ways out. The earliest it will possibly go into beta is next month, so I wouldn't expect a release until October at the earliest. When it does release though, I'll be happy to help you get it dialed in.



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[SkyShark]

I highly recommend "Giant Clams in the Sea and the Aquarium" by James Fatherree if you don't already have it. I think it's out of print, but can probably be found on ebay for not too crazy of a price.

 

[SynDen]

giga giga wow! That was worth the drive for sure. Nice work getting it back

 

[MuralReef]

Josh that thing is awesome! Maybe I should consider a mega clam for the school tank rebuild?