New pics, taken with tripod

[dkle]

Today, I hauled out the tripod that my dad bought a long time ago and attempted to take a few pictures. What a pain in the butt to use! On the other hand, I was able to increase the field depth and render the pics much more detailed. It is a perfect setup to showcase the incredible polyp extension that my corals have lately.


ORA Scripp Pink A.millepora






Green A.millepora






Beautiful A.plana, suffered a setback a few months ago when it fell down into the large stinging hammer; but is recovering very nicely

ORA yellow A.batunai, incredible color, polyp extension, and growth, need I say more?






Spectacular blue A.vermiculata, color hard to capture






Pink with purple polyps birdnest (with five lost branches due to recent fragging LOL)






Green slimer A.youngei with flowery polyps






One of my prized possessions, bright green candycane






ORA blue A.millepora. This guy has unbelievable color and polyp extension. Because it is sooo hairy, I don't have a decent pic of it until now.







ORA blue bottebrush

 

[MattD004]

Gorgeous corals! forgot med school, get rich selling frags of these

 

[dkle]

Green birdnest, the picture speaks for itself






A.loripes, beautiful pastel color






A.suharsonoi






A.solitaryensis






Teal cat's paw Stylophora, very unusual color for cat's paw






Very green Poicillopora

 

[EricBrian]

Beautiful pictures and corals.

 

[Lunchbucket]

dkle - amazing pics!! you have some REAL nice corals there!

Lunchbucket

 

[gil716]

Outstanding! And now for the obligatory FTS...

 

[SanFranTodd]

Great polyp extension - I'm so jealous !

 

[kirstenk]

Really great corals and pics!!

 

[dvanacker]

How do you get crazy polyp extension like that.....anything you can think of that you are doing.??

 

[damienkee]

wow! speechless....

 

[CeeGee]

nice. very nice.

It is funny to me that you have all these sweet SPS and you claim that the candy cane is one of your prized posessions. I find it funny as I am rather fond of mine as well. Mine isn't bright green but it has been the best growing coral in my tank.

 

[dkle]

Thanks guys!

Things that I think helping the polyp extensions and growth

1. Regular feeding: I feed every other day alternating between frozen rotifers and golden pearls. I feed them during daytime to "train" them to open their polyps all the times
2. Good filtration system: I have an ASM protein skimmer, lots of chaeto growth, monthly water change
3. Ozone to clear the water and to supposedly denature the harmful chemicals secreted by softies and macroalgae
4. 24/7 use of carbon
5. No fish that bothers SPS ( I used to have three flame angels; they constantly nipped at SPS and the PE was not anywhere near what it is today)


Here are some more for your entertainment

Orange skirt zoanthids






Yellowpolyps






Lavender with green center Palythoas






RED RED RED ricordea yuma






A.copiosa






A.formosa

 

[CeeGee]

NICE YUMA!!!!!

 

[sonofgaladriel]

Those are some of the best reef/coral photographs I have ever seen! Very nice! I am very jealous.

 

[slojmn]

Awesome pictures, incredible clarity and detail. What camera do you use, settings, white balance?

BTW, Great corals as well. Very nice collection .

 

[Cody Ray]

Must have frags!!!!

 

[Horace]

I am so glad I am changing to those lights . I have some nice colors on my SPS as well with T5 but I need some shimmer hehe. Great to see your having such success with the Phoenix. I will be running the Phoenix with a few added T5 actinics as well. Im hoping to add just a tad of 420nm that the phoenix is a bit low on.

 

[Horace]

Oh and I have that same candycane. It is by far the brightest coral I think you can put in your tank. It looks like its nuclear . Mine grows VERY well too. I started out with 8 polyps about 6 months ago. I probably have 32+ now.

 

[creepereefer]

very nice dkle

 

[dkle]

I use Sony DSC-V1 camera at aperture mode (f 8), no flash.

Couple of more pics

A.aculeus, from CoreyK. Notice the shaved branches on the left. Those are from the big sea urchin who decided that eating acro was so much easier than coralline alage. Needless to say, the urchin exists no longer. Bless its SPS-hungry soul!







ORA blue tort A.tortuosa






The so-called Bali echinata. In all likelihood, it is not a true echinata. Probably A.gomezi or somethin'






ORA A.tenuis, the pic doesn't do this guy justice at all. It has yellow branches with bright blue tips




Here it is 2 months ago. Very nice growth if I do say so myself. Notice how much less polyp extension there was? Well, the three flame angels were still in the tank at that time.