I just purchased a Tubastraea faulkneri and was told by the LFS to feed it phytoplankton first to make it open up, and then to feed it a mixture of cyclops and mysis. I have done that for two days and the coral will not open up. I waft about 1 1/2 cc of the phyto over the entire colony, and they do not budge. I have tried it once at night when the polyps were partially open (I have never seen them fully open), and several of the larger polyps got mysis. Should I feed when they are open at night, or stick to trying to get them to open during the day? I want to see them open!
New Sun Coral Feeding
- Thread starter David Jr.
- Start date
cooqiemonsta
New member
do you have them under light?
also i was meaning to ask is it better if i put a sun coral under no light at all?, only the light that come in the room when its day time.
also i was meaning to ask is it better if i put a sun coral under no light at all?, only the light that come in the room when its day time.
scott_richards
New member
From what I've heard you can put them under light or no light. Whichever one you want. I have mine under a 70W halide, growing along side some leather corals
cooqiemonsta
New member
so lets say i put them under no light whatsoever, will they grow better? cuz mines arent looking to good, and i kno they dont really come out in the light.
stunreefer
Reef Hugger
If the polyps are even remotely open, feed the hell out of them with Mysis and other meaty foods. Over time they will begin to remain open. In nature they only open at night as that's when there's the most food present for NPS corals to feed upon, but in captivity we can 'train' them to remain open 24/7 by offering foods during the day. Over time, only feed them during the day, but initially it's of the utmost importance to have them feeding, so if they only open at night, just feed them then for a while and ween them onto day feedings.
If they refuse to open at all, use the "tupperware" trick, in which you'll remove the colony from your display and feed them in a container. Douse the container with phyto and/or other foods to get the polyps to open, once they do, feed them meaty foods. Here is a pic of this method: http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1528186&perpage=&pagenumber=2
Be careful using phyto in your main tank as it can and will foul the water very fast.
If they refuse to open at all, use the "tupperware" trick, in which you'll remove the colony from your display and feed them in a container. Douse the container with phyto and/or other foods to get the polyps to open, once they do, feed them meaty foods. Here is a pic of this method: http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1528186&perpage=&pagenumber=2
Be careful using phyto in your main tank as it can and will foul the water very fast.
Thanks stunreefer. I put about 1 1/2 cc phyto (hopefully my water won't suffer as I have the CPR Biocube skimmer) followed by a fair amount of cyclops. About half of them were partially open (No tentacle extension) so I dropped mysis onto them. The ones that got mysis ate them well, and about 2 hours later 1/4 of the polyps are still open. I'm happy so far, but maybe next time I wont have to use as many cyclops.
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