Coral Suggestions

[dacia]

I am going to be adding some more corals to my tank very soon, and I would appreciate any suggestions that you may have. It is a 30 gallon tank with 130W PC. I already have star polyps, green and purple mushrooms, and red & green zoos. I want a toadstool, ricordeas, and something else, possibly yellow polyps. What would you suggest for my reef?

 

[gregm779]

Ricordias, Frogspawn or Hammers. Or all three.

 

[rossim]

I have a 29 gallon with 130 watts PC and in addition to whats mentioned above you can get a Torch, Fungia (Plate corals) for the sandbed, Brain Coral (Wesophelia???), and Bubbles are cool!

 

[dacia]

I didn't think that I could have a brain coral with my lighting. I've always thought that they need VHO or MH. What variety of brain coral could I have?

 

[tru conch]

open brain, (trachophillya) or (wellsophyilla)
if you are looking for yellow polyps, then pick up yellow polyps (they are similar to zoos)
if you wanted you could keep xenia as well as the other lps corals mentioned.
hth

 

[dacia]

Thanks for the suggestions. I now have a list of what I want to get for my next swf.com order:
bubble coral
green plate coral
ricordea polyp
That should get me to the minimum order amount and maybe a month later I will get:
toadstool leather
open green brain
another ricordea (I think they're beautiful!)
I'd love to have frogspawn and hammer corals, but they are out-of-stock and my LFS's coral selection is slim. I saw a toadstool yesterday and was completely closed up...quite sad becuase they are quite beautiful when extended. Oh well.
What are your opinions of my 2 order choices? Would you get those corals in a different order? (I had been buying only 1 coral at a time and I am not sure about adding multiple at a time) Thanks again!

 

[rossim]

Adding three corals at once won't be a problem. They have a very small bioload. Your selections look good. Just make sure that the place coral is a short-tentical plate. Long-tentical plates don't seem to do well in captivity (at least in my experiences).
HTH

 

[sweetreef]

i have a closed brain in my tank now for 8 months with your same lighting dacia and is doing very well awsome to look@with the actinic lights on

 

[sammiefish]

Ive had good luck with Montipora caporcornis in the top 1/3 of my tank using PC lighting...
Growing like a weed!!! I think it might be the best beginner SPS!!

 

[sweetreef]

also a toad doing great they are cool add to the tank!!!!!

 

[tgill]

If you get a plate coral go with the short tenticle. Cool coral that is really ez to keep.

 

[theweena]

is 130 watts enough lighting to have hard corals...i heard it wasnt but i was just wondering

 

[dacia]

Depending on tank size, 130W is enough to keep some LPS corals.
Sweetreef, those pictures are great! A lot of my pictures are wonderful on my computer, but they seem to lose something when I resize them to post on this website. They get fuzzy. :notsure:
Anyway, from LFS I reserved today a hammer coral, and xenia that is sharing a rock with a green finger leather. (all of these were unavailable from here, so I plan to buy from my list above from here later on this month or January). I will add them to my tank next Thursday when I pick them up.
I was planning to get the short tentacle plate rather than long anyway. From the pictures, I simply thought the short tentacle plates looked nicer. :yes:

 

[sammiefish]

remember... its the intensity... not watts or watts / gallon... The lights you describe (power compact flourescent and I assume 10000 K color temp).. will be enough for a Montipora placed in the top 1/2 of your tank directly below the bulb... Id be more concerned with water quality