These are the harder to keep corals, aren't they?

[MarineOne]

 

[SBJim]

No, those are the easy ones. Macroalgae is the tough stuff.

 

[Sk8r]

Not bad if you meet their life requirements: lots of calcium and mh light.

 

[MarineOne]

Hmmm,

I thought the SPS hard corals were the hardest to keep?

 

[Kinetic]

oooh a regal =) so beautiful.

 

[nellie54914]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7966992#post7966992 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by MarineOne
Hmmm,

I thought the SPS hard corals were the hardest to keep?

They do tend to be the most difficult, but once your tank is established and if you have high light and good flow they're not bad. You just have to make sure you keep your calcium high enough so they keep growing. We don't have a ton but have some SPS. I don't know the names of a lot of them, but it looks like most in focus in the pic are acros. We only have 1 of those so I don't know much about them. If you have enough light and are looking to try some SPS, montipora digitata are really easy to keep, and they grow pretty fast. I've also had good luck with a couple millepora.

Those are some awesome corals in the pic, I wish our tank would look like that someday!

 

[kass03]

pocillapora are easy to keep also.

kass

 

[mako56]

That is an awsome picture. You can almost smell it.

 

[jmkarcz]

I have been slowly switching over the last year... My tank is that if something is wrong, your Softies will tell you now... if you wait, it takes about 2 weeks for the hard coral to tell you.

I moved my Mont, Capricornious up higher when I had compacts because they can from someone who had brighter lights... 6 months later I plugged in my new hallides... It took 3 weeks before I noticed the color was slowly bleaching out. I have now moved them lowed, and the are coloring up again.

Like this...

about 4 months after I got it...
<a href="http://photobucket.com" target="_blank"><img src="http://i28.photobucket.com/albums/c205/jmkarcz/IMG_0011_resize.jpg" border="0" alt="Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting"></a>

about 2 weeks before the halides....
<a href="http://photobucket.com" target="_blank"><img src="http://i28.photobucket.com/albums/c205/jmkarcz/IMG_0785_resize.jpg" border="0" alt="Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting"></a>

and about 3 weeks after...
<a href="http://photobucket.com" target="_blank"><img src="http://i28.photobucket.com/albums/c205/jmkarcz/IMG_2684.jpg" border="0" alt="Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting"></a>

notice the difference in the light color. same camera taking the pic.


Jason

 

[MarineOne]

Ok,

What happens to the SPS hard corals when they "die". Do they just stop growing - or do they lose their color, crumble, etc.?

 

[Aquabucket]

They bleach and turn into a white skeleton. A problem with SPS like acros is they can crash quickly if you lose power and can't keep your temperature down and the water circulating. Other hardier corals like LPS and softies can handle such situations much better. If you want an SPS dominated tank a chiller with a back-up power supply is a good form of protection. A calcium reactor is highly desired to promote the high growth rates many SPS corals can achieve in captivity. Simply put SPS corals such as acroporas require a bit more of an investment to keep long term. I good thing about them though is if you have all the tools in place you can make some cash back on frags from fast growing colonies.

 

[jandlms]

Spike,
is ther a brand name battery backup out there that can power a chiller for more than a few minuts? I might be interested. Its been tough keeping temps down this summer even with a remote sump in the basement.
jandlms

 

[spineshank385]

buy a generator. thats about the only thing that will power a chiller in the event of a power outage.

 

[Aquabucket]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7975009#post7975009 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by jandlms
Spike,
is ther a brand name battery backup out there that can power a chiller for more than a few minuts? I might be interested. Its been tough keeping temps down this summer even with a remote sump in the basement.
jandlms

A marine battery and an inverter is your best bet. You can use a car to recharge it and swap out the car battery to keep things going or use your car as a generator with the inverter.

 

[MarineOne]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7967014#post7967014 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Kinetic
oooh a regal =) so beautiful.

Yes, hopefully soon to be my regal

I just wanted to make the fish in my aquarium seem "more at home", but since most of the fish will pick at/eat softer corals and the hard ones are hard to keep, looks like I will have to get creative with the live rock...

Or buy the fake corals....