Monti and Birdsnest coral care?

[ichthyogeek]

So today I decided to buy some SPS corals. My tank is stable water parameter wise (it was upgraded from a 29 to a 55 a while ago). I liked the look of a fuzzy green Birdsnest frag(S. hystrix I think), and since it was only 10$, I figured why the heck not? The other SPS I bought was a green Montipora frag. It was originally labelled for 15$, but I got it for 5$ when I noticed how sickly it was. I've done a little bit of reading up on both corals in the months prior, but I still don't feel remotely prepared. Flow is provided by 2 Hydor 850's, in the gyre form as recently shown in Coral magazine. Lighting is a BML XB 14000K LED and 2 TruLumen blue LED moonlights. I've dimmed the light to 25% as I don't want to burn the corals. Lighting has also been reduced to 8 hours/day (9-5). The frags are basically where I want them. Other corals are a Galaxy LPS (very far away from both frags), mushroom anemones (far below them), a kenya tree (far away), and some Briareum polyps (far away). Future corals include either a Scolymia or a Trachyphyllia/Wellsophyllia, Sansibia polyps, and (while not a coral) Caulerpa prolifera macroalgae.

I'm used to things with a mouth...so how do I feed them? The lady at the LFS where I bought them mentioned zooplankton, but I'm pretty sure that my tank is devoid of it. I'd like to get the sickly Monti recovered as fast as possible, and feeding the Birdsnest seems like a good idea as well. I've got shrimp, squid, mussels, clams, phytoplankton, Instant BBS from Reef Nutrition, Brine shrimp, PE Mysis, and small pellets. Umm..what do they like?

Do I just increase the lighting intensity by a little bit every day and the longevity by 15 minutes every day as well?

I've done the regular information search, but I feel like I'm missing something here...help please?

 

[Docdiggy]

I've never fed my birdsnest or montis.Good water and flow is all they need. Lighting too, but they are not high demand.

 

[Bootlegger]

You don't have to feed photosynthetic corals. All you need is good lighting, stable parameters, and good water flow. If you're corals are having issues, and your confident your lighting, flow, and water parameters are solid, then you may need to wait for a while to acclimate your corals. I recently moved a bunch of my corals from my 30 gallon nano to a 75 gallon tank. I'm running 6x T5HO with excellent water quality and flow...but a few of my corals are browned out and growing too slow. Odds are they are having a hard time acclimating. My old tank was a high-nutrient, LED lit system. Now I'm running low-nutrient and T5s. It's clearly enough difference to bug some of my coral.

 

[ichthyogeek]

But...where do they get the other elements they need? Photosynthesis only produces carbohydrates in the form of glucose. So where do they get their nitrogen that they use for building tissues? The calcium and carbonate they need to build their skeletons? The phosphorus necessary for DNA?

 

[buy_baff]

But...where do they get the other elements they need? Photosynthesis only produces carbohydrates in the form of glucose. So where do they get their nitrogen that they use for building tissues? The calcium and carbonate they need to build their skeletons? The phosphorus necessary for DNA?

Fish poo provides the nitrogen and phosphorus. Calcium and carbonate come from your water and most people dose them to keep them stable.

 

[rt67ghy]

When you have a mature tank there'll be tiny living organisms such as zooplankton and phytoplankton in the water column. The flow will take these to your corals and they'll feed on this and grow as well as getting sugars from the zooaxanthellae. These micro-organisms will feed on the nutrients released into the water by the food that you feed the fish and from the fish wastes.