Which sea fan is the easiest to keep?

[victor_c3]

I'm interested in adding some non-photosynthetic sea fans to my tank, but I'm not sure which ones I'm most likely to have success with. I know that Acalycigorgia (blueberry sea fan) is extremely hard, if not impossible to keep. However, I'm curious if people have any success with Menella sp. (the purple variety) and Diodogorgia nodulifera (both the yellow and red variety "finger gorgonians").

Any thoughts? Are there any NPS sea fans that I'm not thinking about that people typically have some level of success with?

 

[teemee]

I've been keeping an nps tank for 3+ years now, and buy anything i can get my hands on.
imho, of the nps gorgonians that can be easily found, menella is definitely the easiest. The red/purple base with the yellow polyps... there is also a variant with pink/purple base and white polyps that does equally well. the purple base with purple polyps is also quite hardy, but not as much the other two.
good luck!

 

[noy]

I agree with the menella - i have quite a few in the tank (trying to get all the colour variants).

Diodogirogia can be finicky but very maintainable. They do need a lot of food for sustenance.

Stay away from the ones with very small polyps - those (generally) tend to be trickier.

I had an orange swiftea for over 8 months before infection got to it (i had fragged a piece for someone - you could see the infection for the cut - whole thing died in a few days).

 

[titi59]

I have a yellow menella, a purple menella and ellisella (or Leptogorgia) red with white polyps, in recent months, and all are doing very well by feeding every day

 

[Keoki18]

Are you looking for purely nps gorgonian fans, or just any gorgonian to fiddle with? I have been keeping species of Rumphella with great success. They are easy due to their photosynthetic tendencies.