Plate coral... need help!

[oxkisses12ox]

I have had my plate coral for around two weeks, and i have been looking in books and online and i cant figure out how i know if something is wrong, or if it is going to die? what are the signs i look for? Sometimes it is fully extended , and others partially... should it be fully extended all the time??
ANY TIPS would help.. i want to make sure nothing happens to it...

 

[roader247]

Do you have any pic's I also have a small piece of plate in my Bio Cube someone gave it to me at a reef club meeting mine seems to be doing well here's a pic I know they need calcium

 

[ChickenCannoneer]

That looks like a monti plate not a plate coral that is a round disk.

 

[Qckwzrd]

my plate opens all the way when lights are out and the tentacles are out partially during the day. that is normail. I feed it some diced shrimp and krill once a week.

 

[chrisstie]

That sounds normal. I don't directly feed mine but it ususally grabs a mysis nearly every day from normal fish feeding time. It definitely seems more puffy at night - more ufo\disc shaped and in the day its more volacno shaped.

Any bad signs would be tissue recession- seeing a white skeleton showing underneath. Mine i think has been nipped once or twice from a fish but heals up fast- BAD signs are lots of white or brown stuff covering it looking like an infection.

keep your Ca levels up and feed occasionally and it should be fine

 

[MikeP471612]

I have an orange one and for the first couple weeks the tenticals didn't show at all when the lights were on. Now it's tenticals are parcially out all the time. I try to make sure a few mysis land on it a couple times a week and the tenticals bring them over to the mouth. Pretty neat to watch too.

HTH

 

[strayvoltage]

The fungia or plate coral is a funny one at times. I have had mine for 18 months now and have seen it act many different ways. It has deflated and stayed that way for as long as two weeks at a time and then seems to go back to what I guess you could call normal. Like chrisstie said, as long as you dont see any white skeleton or any tissue loss, all is prob ok. They do usually inflate and have tentacles more so after lights out. That is the feeding mode. It needs plenty of light but adapts to lower light pretty easy, and flow should be medium to low. They like it best if on the sand. Don't do well if picked at or if sand or debris are on them. They waste a lot of energy to try to get that type of stuff off them all the time. Give it time to acclamate to your tank. Sometimes this can take a few days to even as long as a month.

 

[Qckwzrd]