sun coral question???

jun_18T

New member
hi there guys....i saw this coral in my LFS about 2 weeks ago and i really wanted it. i went home and did a lot of research and reading about it. yesterday i finally went and grabbed it and took it home. it was on the tank about 7pm and that was about the time my lights turns off. the whole night i was waiting for it to open but it did not. i tried doing the open bottom bottle trick and sprayed some mysis in there but it never opened up. is this normal and is the coral still acclimating to the new tank or there is something wrong??? and one more question.....should it be placed totally out of the lights??? what happens if it is not??

thanks guys
 
When I had my sun coral it took about a week before it really started to react to feedings. After that I was able to train it to open during the day (by feeding during the day). I kept mine out in the open under mh.
 
Sun corals usually open in half of hour before the lights are off and stay open for a prolonged time at the night.

Mine (I have several kinds) opened 3 times a day (in low light tank), after the fish was fed, to pick up own share. For a few kinds it was necessary to make them open to feed at the beginning (details are here).

Adding cyclop-eeze usually works for sun corals, that already were opening for a feeding, container feeding - for a stubborn cases, prolonged repeated placing food onto the mouth, even if no tentacles are seen - for starved, particularly bad situations.

Watch for reaction of the coral on the flow: for me high skeleton pure yellow one preferred high flow, black bushy one - took forever to start eat, but after it became a greedy eater, worst was not a rare T. micrantha, but a common low polyps intense orange one. Just continue placing food in contact with mouths. After breaking period it will be much easier.

If grocery seafood do not work at beginning, or were spit off, try the whole food from LFS - mysis, PE mysis, and switch to the other kinds later. Was important for lemon yellow one.
HTH
 
thanks dendro....

well this morning i was able to feed them a little bit of frozen mysis. i literally put the mysis in front of their mouth. it took a while before they were able to swallow it...will this improve in time??? im attaching a couple of pics for you to see and identify which exactly is this one i have. can you also tell me if this is how far their polyps will extend????

IMG_2520.jpg



IMG_2519.jpg
 
I belive (link to Tubastrea colors) that this is Tubastrea faulknery, very nice and reliable coral.

Timing improves with time, as coral starts eating and opening better and better each time, within month you should have full polyp extension.

Here is mine, the same as yours, at beginning:
Apr29sunNC.jpg

Jul13_06.jpg

and 1.5 yrs later:
jul24_07.jpg

sunoct2807big.jpg


But I put mine through container feeding (removing from the tank for an immersion in feeding "soup"), first week few times:
inprocess.jpg

Some sun corals and their relatives are reluctant to open at the beginning, most - not.

And is tour torch coral upflow (upwind) from the sun coral? I had frogspawn, upflow and up, it dropped tips of branches a couple of times, one landed on sun coral and damaged one polyp.
HTH
 
I just got a suncoral on Friday, I have been feeding it during the day as I would like it to be on during that time to enjoy its beauty. So far so good, I was tossing the idea of getting this coral due to its requirements but glad I did as the extra work is so worth the beauty it provides.

I have been using is syringe with a straw attached to the end of it and direct feed it quite easily this way.

Good luck with yours they are so beautiful....:)
 
hey "lucknano"....you mind posting some pics of yours??? how much does your open up already???

also whereabouts are you in canada???

thanks bro!
 
I live in B.C.

I would post some pics but boy its a pain in the butt here as you have to go through all the steps that I just don't understand. Its not like other forums for posting pics.

Whats your email and I will send the pic to you.....:)
 
luckynano:
You can post pictures at free image host, like http://www.photobucket.com. Then copy-paste IMG string right into the post here, at RC. Then click Preview to see result.

For PhotBucket you will need subscribe (free) and upload images from you computer.

Preferably resize photo to ~500 pix (maximal dimension), using any photo editing software, that you have. I'm using freeware IrfanView, it is sufficient and fast.

And you can use images from Photobucket in different places, if you wish.
 
Okay, this is frusterating. I hate photobucket first off but have the image on there. So now I try and load it onto the site here and cannot what the heck am I doing wrong.

I wish it was as easy as the other forums where you go to the browse and then load from there so much easier.
 
nice coral "nano"....

i guess the store i got my coral from really didnt know how to feed this thing. i guess mine was really starved because i had it for a week now and it still looked like the pics i posted. they still wont open up during feeding time. they will feed but it really takes a long time. are they eventually going to open up like yours???
 
So these corals can be put in a lighted area? I was under the impression that they had to stay in a cave or dark spot. I always wanted to get one for my 150 gallon, but was afraid of it getting to much light (tank only has 6 96 watt pc). Sounds like I have been worried about nothing.
 
As for light, I have seen these corals in all sorts of lighting but their needs are not light demanding as you know. Mine is in my 5 gal nano with 18 watts 50/50 pc lighting which is by no means high intensity lights. I am sure others can help you with your lights and concerns though.

I was very lucky to get such a nice coral indeed. The other ones in the store were just about all dead as they don't feed them and like most lfs they want stock in and out just as fast.

I would take the time to feed it and let it adjust to your tank etc. From what i have read they can bounce back and grow very beautifully.

What are you feeding??
 
i feed them frozen mysis every other day...they can finish 1 cube but it'll take about 30-45 mins. is this enough???
 
Well I am sure that is fine, this coral is very new to me also. I don't feed one cube though as I don't want a bunch of the food laying around my tank and i have a small tank. I feed each head.

I am just learning as well with this coral, maybe others can give their opinion.
 
here is my sun coral at 3 weeks now since buying it starved from the LFS....you guys think its starting to get healthy???

thanks!


IMG_2644.jpg



IMG_2646.jpg
 
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