Florida Sea Cucumber - Holothuria floridana - Small

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The Florida Sea Cucumber (Holothuria Floridian) is an excellent worker, scouring the substrate for detritis and organic matter. It is slightly knobby and usually has calico coloration, white with brown and black markings. Coloration is highly variable however and can be various shades and combinations of white, brown, black and even yellow in rare individuals. When agitated or stressed cucumbers will excrete a substance which will be white and very sticky to deter predators. This cucumber is also known as the White Sandsifting Cucumber and the Caribbean Sea Cucumber.

Holothuria cucumbers are often known as "sand-sifting" or "sand-mopping" cucumbers. While most cucumbers extend feeding oral tentacles into the water to catch free-floating plankton, these cucumbers move along the bottom and use their sticky oral tentacles like mops to collect detritus, bacteria, microalgae and other food particles. Many will burrow into the substrate or extend their bodies out from the protection of rockwork to feed. With the exception of very large systems, it is best to limit cucumbers to one per tank. Multiple cucumbers can often deplete an aquarium of their food source and lead to the cucumbers starving unless fed heavily.

Like most other cucumbers, these cucumbers can release holothurin toxins which can be very harmful and dangerous to tankmates. They usually only release toxins when threatened or harassed; avoid keeping cucumbers with large hermits or other potential predators. Most fish will not eat a cucumber because of these toxins but cucumbers should not be kept with fish known to be invert predators like triggers, puffers, parrots or fish with similar temperaments and diets.