do mushroom coral like dirty water or clean water?

I would say mushrooms like clean water as all saltwater tank should be lol. They do need moderate lighting and moderate flow. I have a mushroom addiction I have 12 different species so they tell me LOL.
 
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I don't know about the fancy Pacific mushrooms, but the common brick red species definitely do better in richer water with plenty of dissolved organics. Mine stopped growing & multiplying after I cleaned up my tank & ran GFO & mechanical filtration years ago. But I have one small one left that only appears if I happen to procrastinate on maintenance a little too long. It's like a canary in a coal mine or a little organic test meter.

I was actually happy the brick red shrooms went away, but the low nutrient environment also made my Florida Ricordias to shrink away to nothing, and I liked them. Low nutrients also substsntially hinder the growth of zoanthids & fancy palys for me.
 
mushrooms are more tolerable of poor water qualities than other corals, but as a general rule of thumb, all corals require good water quality :)
 
I agree with this ^. "Dirty" water, whatever that means, probably shouldn't be anyone's goal. Letting nutrients & disolved orgsnics get a little higher is another thing entirely. It has its place.
 
By 'rich water' we mean that you don't need an ace number one protein skimmer with mushrooms, but the water should be fairly clear of particulate.
 
I moved a bunch of corals into a larger system. We had a small toadstool, finger leather, fuzzy mushrooms, and various LPS/SPS. The water quality was good, kept up with maintenance, had a skimmer, great flow, and T-5 lighting. Nitrates around 12.5/25, dKH 9, etc. The toadstool grew like crazy, leather and mushrooms just disappeared, monti grew like crazy, and frogspawn got huge. It depends.
 
Last year I was moving up to a 220 from a 125gallon,and I sat all my leathers and LPS in a 20 gallon and sat it in a window,on the kitchen counter, with lots of sun,for a couple months.I only ran a power filter ,air stone and powerhead.I have never had my coral grow so quickly before.I remember the nitrates were about 20 and everything thrived with the natural sunshine.IMO,they like some nutrients in the water.
 
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