Coral food?

Bignasty1

New member
I have been using Marine Snow because it is available locally, and I am almost out. Is there something better to use? I would like to see my lps and zoa frags grow more than they have.
 
My personal favorites in liquid form (in order) are coral-accel, chroma, micro-vert, phyto and zoo. Of course, they're all made by kent. I use the "plex' version but when I get some cash I'm going to go with the "max" version.
Cyclopeeze is excellent for larger filter-feeding inverts. I use my old brine shrimp packages to make cyclopeeze cubes :)
DT's is great for clams, pods, and very fine filter feeders.
Reef Chili is my all time favorite, though. It's super concentrated and when you put it in the water you literally see all types of coral open within minutes. I'm using about 2x the recommended dose and it will probably last me another 2 years haha....
 
i use cyclopeeze but have mostly zoas and phyto plex...i thought coral accel was a nutrient adder..not a food?? never tried micro vert but i probably should may work better for zoas
 
coral-accel it a vitamin supplement geared for corals and not food. It does increase coral growth in most cases, although it will increase nutrients in the tank somewhat, so you have to take that into account. Kinda like zoe-con for corals I suppose.
 
I dont use anything and have no probs growing anything. IMO most of the stuff sold is useless but not all.
 
Nope. The only thing i add to my tank is kalk for topoff(and water changes). Dont get me wrong im sure there are things you can add to help but most just increase nutrients. Something i work very hard to keep low in my tanks.
 
I know the Kent products listed work, you just have to read the labels as some are less concentrated than others it seems.
Dose foods will increase coral growth, but as joey said it's extremely difficult to do so and not have a nutrient problem unless you have a massive sump or display tank. In most cases it's more important to dose kalk and keep nutrients low than it is dose foods, unless you target feed as to avoid free floating nutrients as much as possible.
But then again, if you're running a leather/muchroom/LPS type tank you have more wiggle room when it comes to nutrients.
But over all, water quality >> coral food.
 
Ill agree with that. I dont want to steer anyone from doing what works for them. I just do what works for me. There is a few products i will be tryin in me sps tank in the near future but cant say ill use them long depends on if i fell like there usefull or not. Like Theown said it really depends on what your tryin to keep. I feel like if your going to add stuff to feed the tank its better to target feed than to just pour it in the tank and walk away. But thats just IMO
 
Zoanthids -- unlike palythoa -- feed on the very tiniest of zooplankton. CE is too big for most of them. Target feeding with a very fine slurry of chopped food (with the pumps off) is the most promising method. This slurry can certainly include CE; it's a great food. Oyster eggs are a more appropriate size, but too expensive for routine use.

If you have palythoa, they can take somewhat larger pieces and will be more aggressive about feeding, but generally you don't need to do much at all with these guys; they are very good at growing with no help at all.

There is no need at all to buy expensive bottles of "coral food" which are mostly water. Making your own from the various saltwater foods available in fish stores plus human grade seafood is easy, much cheaper and has no preservatives and chemicals and freezes well for ease of daily use. Just be sure to include as wide of a variety of foods as you can. This is where your local Asian market is your friend: the range of seafoods available in a well stocked Asian market is astonishing. (And often quite creepy to those with western notions about seafood.)

Your carnivorous fish will be happy to eat it, too. Just make a batch with larger chunks for them.

Depending on the species of LPS, many feed by absorption. They will react to target feeding, but won't actually eat it. LPS with distinct polyps (like blastos and acans) target feed easily.
 
Nicole, how exactly do you prepare your home-made food? I've read Eric's "Famous" coral food recipe but it's quite vague in amounts of each item, and I really have no need for that much food. A sandwich-sized bag would probably last me months. What items would you recommend for just making small batches?
 
The exact amounts are vague because it doesn't matter. We aren't making a souflee, we're making goo and freezing it. :)

Just use smaller amounts of each ingredient. Add/remove ingredients as needed. If you like seafood, it's an excellent item to make a big seafood stew or similar and just save one or two of each item for the fish/coral food. Or if you go to a fresh seafood place, they will look at you strange but they will sell you one scallop, one oyster...

You are still going to make too much. :) I have gotten better at making smaller and smaller amounts, but I still always have 3 or 4x as much as I can use before it's freezer burned -- but the fish and corals don't seem to care even if it is, and freezer burn doesn't affect nutrition.
 
i have seen it but not tried it yet...i wanted to try it but did see it available for my order...

i have been thinking about making my own food which was going to include jumbo shrimp, scallop, cyclopeeze, phytoplex and some brightwell aminomega...sound ok?? i wanted to add something else but not sure what
 
Use plain RAW table shrimp, with the shells on and everything. You may want to include some mysis, krill, clams, etc.

I would not worry about adding any supplements. I would also skip the phytoplex (it's too large for almost all filter feeders) in favor of concentrated phytoplankton, something like Instant Algae.
 
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