Sand covered coral

[gareth.hubbarde]

Hi there, my pistol shrimp has a habit of shifting the sand in the tank and ends up burying the bottom dwelling corals. It's a daily ritual to blow the sand away again. Is it OK for the corals to be covered?

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[billdogg]

I was going to guess sand sifting goby, but yes, happens all the time, and not a whole lot you can do to prevent it short of removing the offender.

 

[jayball]

Many corals can deal with it and knock it off during their deflate/inflate (night and day) cycle if it is not a lot. If sand is constantly on them or building up over time then it will kill them. Some are not very tolerant, especially fleshy LPS, and will develop infections over time.

 

[Tripod1404]

Corals that naturally live on sand such as plate corals (fungai) and to some extend folded brain corals (trachyphyllia) can tolerate it. Plate corals are nearly impossible to bury as they inflate a lot and can clean themselves. Folded brains will also inflate to push sand away but not as much and they need water flow to actually push sand away (they just inflate and wait current to carry sand away).

Corals that do not naturally live on sand are more prone to having tissue recession due to sand.