Elegans question

[bennym]

Was at the LFS to pick up a couple of corals for my tank. The store had a couple gorgeous elegans corals. Was talking with the store owner. He hadn't heard of the problems with elegans on the internet, but said he hasn't have had any major problems with the ones he has been selling. Only problems were all from the same batch; he didn't sell the corals - he knew the batch was bad from the start. Put in his home tank, so far they are okay.

I know that people have been having troubles with elegans, but I am thinking about taking a chance. According to the LFS owner, the elegans come from a collector in Jakarta -hopefully this is good source and I would have success.

What does every one else think - should I try it or pass?

Mark

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"I reef, therefore I spend."

 

[Kirbster]

There are many collectors based in Jakarta, some better than others. The fact that your LFS guy actually knew that Jakarta was a place indicates he is smarter than 90% of the LFS owners out there. I imported and subsequently sold two Elegance in February. Both are still fine in two different tanks. I also have one personally that is four years old and healthy as a horse. During 1997 and early 1998 I worked at an LFS and every single Elegance we got died, even if it went straight to someone's tank from the bag and never touched our water. I really have no clue what the deal was. Why would collecting practices on one particular coral decline suddenly and dramaticly and then get better.

In any case, I would say to try it.

KA

P.S. The ones I got that lived were also Indonesian/Jakarta. FWIW

 

[jimhobbs]

On a side note, I was wanting to add a small elegance to my ten gallon work tank...The only other coral is a small xenia cutting...I can keep them seperate, and will trim back the xenia as needed...Is there any problem with the xenia/elegance mix?

Thanks...Jim

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

 

[Rad Reefer]

what some people fail to remember is that Elegans come from nutrient rich waters.Usually they're covered with so much silt and debris that they can barely be seen.If they are introduced into a tank with powerful skimming often they won't do well for very long.
I had a gorgeous one for 3 years and then swithced from a Red Sea berlin to an ETS Gemini 800 and that was the beginning of the end.The skimmer robbed the water of the extra nutrients that it needed to grow.The extra nutrients were not affecting anything else in the tank but their removal IMO was the kicker.

Just my two cents.

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[bennym]

kribster, thanks. I think I will go ahead and try it. By they way, where did you place yours in the tank? Sand or rocks? The LFS has it on the rocks (plate corals on the sand) so he said he would put it high in the tank and slowly move it down to the sand.

jim, per TRA, the elegans need about 6 inches around it from other species. Except for the Galaxy corals, I don't think you would have any problems with combining two species in a 10G.

Rad, Thanks for the advice. My skimmer is barely pulling anything out, probably due the incredible caulerpa growth in my tank - I trim it about twice a week and stil has taken over a good 1/5 of the tank. Might I'll try turning of the skimmer when adding the Elegans and see how it does.

 

[Kirbster]

Mine is on the rocks. I wish it wasn't, but it is sort of glued there, and I'm not going to rip it off. They live naturally in the sand, sometimes even getting covered with sand. It should do fine on the sand.

Rad has an extremely good point. The one I have had for years is in a lagoonal tank. The light is low, the nutrients are high. I mean high! I detritus feed the tank regularly and pour in quite a bit of food. I think the trend to less and less feeding and the trend to super skimmers from hell (read: ETS)is having a bad affect on our ability to keep a lot of corals, not just Elegance.

Take a look at my tank here. There is a nice pic of the Elegance. I've used a skimmer (CPR BakPak off an on. Currently it has been skimmerless for about 9 months.

http://www.creativenaturescapes.com/fish/Pictures/albumcont.htm

KA

 

[RobertK]

Hi, mind if I jump in on this one, too?

What sort of current do they like? I've got a spot in my tank that is far enough away from the rest of the corals, but it is very close to the return line, so the current is high. Wondering if I could put an elegance there.

Thanks,
RK

 

[dendronepthya]

I have never seen an elegance that liked current. I almost lost the one I have because I had it in a moderately high flow area. It extends much better in low current areas of the tank. Mine seems to like strong light against the recommendation from others. It does not extend very well under the VHO's, but really comes out under 400W halides.

 

[Reef Junkie]

Hey guys,
I also have an Elegance. I've had it for almost a year now. It is doing very good under 400watt MH and actually loves the current bursts from the surge makers I have. I don't think it would do well with a constant current, though. It sits in the sand and opens up beautifly when the 400's come on. I also feed it once a month or so. Not too much. I think one of the keys to my success with the elegance is the Caulerpa Refugium I have in-line with the tank. It supplies quite a bit of nutrients to the water, but doesn't overwhelm the tank. Otherwise the SPS corals would stop growing altogether.
Also, I was wondering if anyone has come across Elegance with short Tentacle-Itis? I'm lucky to not have this problem, but I've seen quite a few elegance that have this problem. Especially newly imported specimens. It could just be the shipping, but this seems to be a new problem. I've also worked for a Saltwater coral/fish wholesaler and this was never a problem.
Later,
Bill

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http://www.homestead.com/reefjunkie/highenergy.html

 

[bennym]

Thanks for the info everyone. Picked up the elegans Monday. Like the LFS owner recomended, put the elegans on the rocks and will move it down to the sand later so it does not have trouble acclimating to the light change-was only 8" from the lights at the store.

So far its extending real well under 150W of light (2X55 PC & 2X20 NO). Plans in the near future are to add more light and a 10G refugium.

Plan on re-arranging my setup over the weekend to be more of a lagoon type tank. Originally set up with the rock along the back and only a strip of sand in the front-will move the rock into a horseshoe shape to have a place for the elgans in the sand. Besides, my return is near the bottom and I will need to move it up so the current isn't blowing on it constantly.

Mark