sun coral?

[PJSEA]

In the beginning I could feed mine in a separate container but as it grew it became more difficult. It did not want to open up after pulling it from the tank. I just feed it in place now.
Use a 2 liter soda bottle with it's bottom cut off. Place it over the coral and put your food mixture thru the top with a baster.
I use a mix of blended shrimp, scallop, mysis, etc.

 

[Qckwzrd]

be sure to keep track of your water specs. I had a quite a few suncorals in my nano tank but wasnt washing the food off and wasnt doing partial water changes like I should have (bad me )I gave most of mine away to save them but the couple I have left are making a come back and some had babies.

I have dendros now but the suncorals are still my fav of all

 

[Qckwzrd]

here are some old pics from the ones I use to have...

Hell of a three some

 

[thecichlidpleco]

mikekman, those are dendros, not sun coral,
Qckwzrd, how do the black ones fair,
and to answer feeding question I do same as cichlid nutz and they are doing fine, they come out during the day also when I feed the tank because they know they will be put into a bowl soon.

 

[Qckwzrd]

thecichlidpleco, the black ones came out during the day faster then the orange or yellows. All of them were trained to come out during the day. I started to take them out to feed then spot fed them after a month or two with a turkey baster.

 

[mikekman]

thecichlidpleco -I know its a dendro, I was just showing him dendros in case he wanted something that looked like a sun coral but would open all day.

qckwzrd -NICE suncorals......too bad some started to die. I like the yellow a lot. Looks cool. Remember to keep up on the water changes.....I don't think you want your dendros to die!

 

[thecichlidpleco]

Yea sorry, I just seen yours on the dendros page, I just know people have dendros or suns and think they are the opposite sometimes.
qckwzrd. what is the coloring like on the black sun, foster and smith never shows it and I know a pic can still be deceiving, they your fav or you like the regulars?

 

[mikekman]

thecichlidpleco, here are some pics of my black sun coral

I do notice that if it opens its mouth, the mouth slit area is neon green. pretty cool!

You should get a black sun coral......they look great. Add a little black to your tank!

 

[bbehring]

I've ahd mine for 3 weeks and they seem to be wasting away. I've tried to feed both ways and nothing. Have them located mid way up in the tank. Maybe too much light? 250w mh 6 hrs. Supplemented by T5 for 10 hrs/day.

 

[thecichlidpleco]

Once you go black...

 

[thecichlidpleco]

I shelter my suns, with a cavelike place for shade. Not lovers of strong light.

 

[mikekman]

bbehring, light shouldn't bother the sun corals at all. They are nonphotosynthetic so they don't need light.

What they need is to be fed food. Do you feed them meaty foods? I feed my nonphotosynthetic corals mysis soaked with selcon. They seem to be responding well to that.

Also, do you do water changes, check your nitrates,etc? When you get corals like these, with all the constant feedings, they can die if there is high nitrates.

Mike

 

[Qckwzrd]

I like all the suncorals the "tangerine" color one is my fav color. My black colony had atleast 20 heads. Right now my babies are doing great, and I have about 5 heads of black and 7-8 heads of orange all small. Mike nice lil suncoral colony I always wanted to do a tubastrea tank...

 

[mikekman]

Qckwzrd, why don't you get one of those little nanocubes like the biocube 14 and add a aquafuge to the back of it and a skimmer and make it an all out "Non photosynthetic coral tank". Gorgonias, dendrophyllias, dendronepthyas, rhizos, sun corals, etc!

My little biocube 14 is kind of like that. Its got sun corals, dendros, and a waratah anemone.

It can be done!

 

[mikekman]

Guys, look at this unknown sun coralish thing in my tank:

It was only 1 and then about 2 weeks ago, it all of a sudden I could see 3 bumps on its side, then a few days later you could see the bumps become little babies. Now, look at the babies.......they are almost the size of the parent! AND, there are 2 more babies coming out. Its weird.........5 babies so quickly! The parent is about the diameter ofan eraser at the end of a pencil so its not big and is about 1/4 of an inch long.

I have shown it on the lps id forum and had someone who is really knowledgable tell me it may be a branching sun coral. If so, its cool and is definitely small! Not that big at all!

 

[Qckwzrd]

I have three tanks already (one planted, one nano reef and other lungfish tank) I don't have the space for anymore tanks/pets. if I do a nonphotosynthetic tank I would need a super skimmer and an r/o system for water changes. I'm gonna slow turn my tank into that as I get more suns, dendros and a rhyzo.

 

[kypatriot]

I feed my sun coral about 5 times a week - only meaty foods. It eats fozen mysis, krill, squid, even small pieces of lance fish from feeding my BTAs.

It has been doing very well for almost a year in my tank, and is open most of the day. I only feed it during the day, so it's always ready to eat.

Mine doesn't seem able to eat small foods like cyclops very well, so I probably wouldn't use something like for it. But it sure does like chunks of meat.

I've nearly killed my shrimp before when I've seen them literally reach down it's throat and pull out the food I just fed it! Feeding earlier in the day (so the food is digested before the lights switch off) put an end to that.

 

[Echidna09]

Yes, shrimp are food mongruls

 

[Qckwzrd]

Bbehring take the suncoral out and put it in a container and feed it cyclops lots of it. Once the tentacles come out rinse of mysis and feed it a cube of that. Do that everyday for about a week or two and it'll come out more and more. A lot of times suncoral aren't fed good in Lfs so they are drained of energy. Be sure to leave them in the container for about an hr and stir the water up with a turkey baster. After it starts to open for food then you can target feed it in your tank.

Kypatriot...any pics?

 

[kypatriot]

Pics

Pics

Sorry my camera skills aren't so hot; I need some time to play with the camera. I just snapped these a minute ago.

This was a pretty small frag when we got it at a frag swap for about $15. The first pic is what it looks like most of the time, with some tentacles partially out.

Next is after feeding it anything at all - all the polyps become fully extended as soon as it tastes food of any kind.