Corals for 10gal nano reef?

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jimhobbs

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Good evening all!...Well, its been around two months since setting up and cycling my ten gallon nano reef...I'm looking for coral suggestions for it...Current animals include a lawnmower blenny and clown..Also, several mushrooms and feather dusters that came on the rock...Lighting is 8.4watt/gallon via two 27 watt pc and 2-18 watt actinics...There is 17lbs marshall rock and 10lbs crushed coral seeded with hundreds of amphipods from my home breeder tank...Circulation is via mj400 in the corner; hid by the marshall rock...Weekly water changes at 30% have been done to handle lack of skimmer...So far, tests show 0-0-0 without skimming, but I haven't ruled out getting a bak-pak if needed...

I was hoping to have a LPS coral along with some additional shrooms and xenia if possible...Any suggestions of corals would be appreciated...Thanks as usual...Jim

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Tank at: members.xoom.com/jimhobbs/reefstats.htm
 
Open brains, cynarina, bubble coral (watch for sweepers) and lobophyllia should all do peachy with those light levels in a 10g.
 
a piece of montipora near the top of the tank should look quite nicely. and it should do well with that amount of lighting.
gotta love the sps's :)
as for lps: trumpet corals would look nice and have relatively short tenticles. and give enough room to expand, a frogspawn would look awsome.
mushrooms: i like puple tonga's, recordias, reds, metallic greens. IMO, small pieces of many different types would look better than one or two large pieces.

have a nice day
psychocoralchopper
 
Thanks for the suggestions...
Cjdevito, I'm seriously considering a small green open brain...I've always wanted one, but didn't have the space in the home tank{so many corals, so little landscape..}

Psychocoralchopper{gotta love that name!}
I've never kept sps before{two yrs at this} and was hoping someone would say I might could keep a small specimen...I know calcium is critical as well as lighting; and recieved my Lamotte calcium kit last week...I'm going to start using it and get the calcium above 400 before introduction of sps...My levels are around 390ppm according to the seatest kit I've been using...I am concerned somewhat on water flow since the mj400 is behind the rockwork and discharging along the back glass...There isn't high flow anywhere except in the back of lthe tank...I may add the sps last after the tank has stabilized with the other additions...There are already two different type of mushrooms that came on the rock; a green striped and a metallic green...There is a small specimen of lps coral{unsure of the name-looks like candycane-caulastrea furcata} that is in my main tank in the bottom-left of tank picture; that I was thinking of taking to work and observing for a few days...If it doesn't expand well, I could always take it back to the home tank...If all goes well, I can start with a coral purchased for the worktank sometime this weekend...That'll give me time to bounce my ideas off ya'll in the days to come...Thanks for all the help...Jim

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Tank at: members.xoom.com/jimhobbs/reefstats.htm




[This message has been edited by jimhobbs (edited 10-25-1999).]
 
In regards to SPS, I'd be cautious about recommending most species for this tank. Certainly 56w of light is not going to be enough to maintain coloration on most acropora species, although they might otherwise do well.

Having said that, if you go with PCC's suggestion of montipora, you might do okay. Try a montipora digitata; very hardy, fast growing, maintains color pretty easily (orange and green are common, pink/red and blue/purple are somewhat harder to find, but not rare).
 
Im not sure about maintaining colors on SPS mine were starting to color up from the brown I recieved them as when one of my lights went bad 2 weeks ago and Im still waiting for a replacement ballast but SPS seem to do pretty good in my tank with lighting less than what you have look on the lightin post by goby for a description.
Scott
 
The "reef guru" at my LFS set up a 10g (same lights)reef he refers to as his "BONZAI REEF".

He only puts small corals in it, like a baby torch, blastomussa, etc. but has to remove animals (like mushrooms) as they grow too big for this tank.

He probably has over a dozen corals in there, yet it doesn't look crowded. A lot of work, but woah!



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My reef:
http://meltingpot.fortunecity.com/uganda/539/reef.html
 
IMHO, as long as the waterflow in the tank is good, the monti should be fine. i don't think that it needs a direct burst of water blowing at it. the one piece of monti that i have does not receive any direct current is has grown quite well. it's even grown enough for me to frag a small piece of it off. and the speed at which it recovers is quite amazing as well; it's only been 10 days and the cut has healed.
by the way, my monti is a green m. digitata.
i think porites would work in a tank like yours too.

have a nice day
psychocoralchopper
 
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