Training Sun Coral

[Henryreef]

I wanted to train my Sun Coral so it will come out during the day. I have had it for about 6 months and was wondering how other people have trained theirs and what tricks and methods they use.

 

[Tennyson]

I've been trying to do that. It's pretty tough and you need to be consistent.

One method I heard was feeding it ONLY during the day time, never at night so it gets used to being fed in daylight.

And others suggest (in addition to feeding only during the day) feeding it at a certain time every day so it starts opening at that time.

 

[dendro982]

I had large fish, that had to be fed three times a day by same food as sun coral eats. Quarter of teaspoon each tine, plus food for other fish. Sun corals opened each time to pick up own share, within 15 min after food was added in water column. But they closed in ~1hr after daytime feeding.

In separate tank, sun corals only, fed once a day - they stay closed until 7:30 PM (19:30). If I have to feed them earlier, than usual, I add small amount of food in water with flow still on. Within 20 min they open to feed, and if this is evening - they stay open for hours.

I would say, feed it when you would like to see it open.
Or find a kind of dendrophyllia, that looks like sun coral, but is open all day long. Firecracker, if I remember right. Never had it, though, information is from dendrophyllia threads.

 

[Henryreef]

Thanks for the advice. I think i will try to spray some mysis or the water i use to thaw it out over the same time everyday. If do this everyday will it be open up at that time each day? Mine currently only opens up at night so getting it open during the day is a challange. I will try to train it to open more in the end of the daylight cycle so it will be less of a change.

 

[dendro982]

:spin1:
All mine (4 different Tubastreas, Dendrophyllia and Cladopsammia) were not connected to the time of feeding, rater reacted on adding food into the water. But read many times that the others were able to train them by feeding in the same time.

 

[Henryreef]

Yeah, I hae notice mine expand a little more whenever food hits the water during the day, but they never come out totaly.

 

[dendro982]

Daytime shots:

Maybe intensity of light makes a difference - mine was 110W 10,000K PC over 90g tank, 48"L x 24"D. The light was intentionally low, so lionfish could swim around during the day.

This shot is in sunlight plus PC during the bright day:

 

[Henryreef]

Nice, those Sun corals are really open for the day! That is my goal, but it might be harder considering I am up grading to MH.

 

[dendro982]

Take a look here or here

 

[Henryreef]

Wow those are amazing!

 

[DuramaxForSnax]

Feed same time everyday for 2-3 weeks

 

[aaron1987]

Mine open whenever I mess with my aquarium -- they used to only respond to food but now, like clockwork, any time I have my hands in the water they will open shortly thereafter for several hours. I've got a colony of faulkneri and micracantha which I've had for 6 mos.

 

[Henryreef]

Wow the results so far are good, it is starting to open during the day. It only opens a little bit so far. But atleast i am getting somewhere.