My dendro, my first real coral!

king_neptune

king_neptune

Active Member
I love this guy!
He eats likea champ!
Beautiful, always open, always ready to eat more.

Garbage pic sorry. This is what they look like:

Anyone with experiance out there raising these?
Can I keep feeding him several times a day, or is that bad?
Can it speed up reproduction?
He has 2 buds forming on his backside, do they get nutrients from the main stock? or do I have to figure out how to feed them as well? They are so small, I dont see how I can do that.
I stuff his mouth when he opens up, and he just keeps chugging it down. I alternate between mysis and brine. But I have a nice assortment of foods. Can I give him just about anything meaty?
I have him in a gentle water flow area, and near the bottom where he can be sheltered from intense light. I chose that spot also because I want him to propagate along that rock.
Anyone have any input or tips, I would really like to hear them Even answers to questions I havent posted. Thanks.
 
petjunkie

petjunkie

Active Member
You can overfeed, and if it's not digested fast enough will rot from the inside out. Not good. I have fed twice a day but small amounts, normally feed once a day or every other day, I feed mainly mysis, but some homemade, occansionally pellets, gel food, whatever is being fed to my other tank. I have also chopped up silversides, krill, larger items but much more rarely. If it's open most of the time it likes the spot, if it stays closed up you might have to change flow or move it. I wouldn't worry about feeding the babies until they are big enough to accept mysis, they seem to do ok without food, unless you have cyclopeeze or something tiny you can feed.
 
king_neptune

king_neptune

Active Member
thanks for intercepting my folly. Ill slack off, and instead of cramming his mouth full every chance I get, Ill slack of to a few mysis 2x a day.(instead of like half dozen or more each session)
Im gonna have to start feeding my shrimp first. All my shrimp like to eat out of my hands, so when I feed they aren't shy about coming over to the other side of the tank and clamoring for food.
Today my cleaner was stealing food from the Dendro, then after I fed him the peppermints started doing the same. Hermits I just push aside, they are on they're own. I cant imagine what it will be like when I start stocking with larger fish. I can see how things can get out of control during feeding time.
 
fretfreak13

fretfreak13

Active Member
I feel your pain. My cleaner and peppermint both steal out of coral's mouths when I spot feed. They're absolutly relentless, and the only thing I've seen work was to distract them first with other food. I cut up a peice of table shrimp, dethaw it, and hand the two of them each a little paice that'll take them a good five minutes to pull apart and eat. Then I feed the coral, and then the fish.
 
king_neptune

king_neptune

Active Member
i think something bad has happened.
I tiny fleck of plastic(looked like a broken peice of egg crate)
Got in his mouth and he swallowed it.
I don't see any feasible way to get it out. Its inside his gut. It was a tiny piece. jsut a little fleck really. Nothing I can do is there?
 
king_neptune

king_neptune

Active Member
Just an update on my dendro...
HAvent ironed out all the kinks.
Hes been closing up recently. Not sick...just not anywhere near as open as he was when I first got him.
Im not sure what to make of it since the water checks great.
I think its possible a diet change is needed.
The mysis shrimp may be getting stale, so ive been feeding him brine shrimp, and ready made coral food mix that I inject directly into him.
On the plus side...
Even though he is not fully extending...he has 3 new buds, giving me a total of 4 heads. One of the new heads is already 1/4 size and is fully capable of feeding!
The other 2 are too small to have polyps yet, but hey...this thing is pretty new to my tank and having this many heads sprout in such a short time is really cool for me!

Thats a good shot showing the biggest of the three. Notice at the bottom is another bit of orange...thats head number 3..its small and barley sprouted a few days ago. Head 4 is also small and on the other side.
 
mrdc

mrdc

Active Member
I had dendros once and I fed mine around 3 times a week. I had to fight the shrimp a lot so I finally started feeding them by adding food to each head and then cover it with a clear cup. I would let it stay that for awhile because if I removed the cup too early, the shrimp would go dig the food out of the dendros mouth. I finally got tired of it and sold the dendro.
 
king_neptune

king_neptune

Active Member
I hear that. I get frustrated at my shrimp stealing.
I feed everyone else first.
I keep the baster on hand to squirt water at the shrimp if they start climbing towards the dendro.
The process takes me an extra 5 min to feed it since I have to baby sit. But once the foods inside and it closes, they all leave it alone.
As for 3x a week, im noticing a lot of people are into that feeding schedule.
At first I was stuffing his mouth 2x a day. Then I dropped it to half the amount, and just once a day.
He really shut himself up for about 2 weeks and I was worried.
THen the new head sprouted, and he suddenly got all happy to open up. The same symptoms are now showing for heads 3 and 4. Maybe it goes into some kind of intense grow mode or something. ANd it closes its tendrils. Im going to start feeding him every other day to see where it takes me.
Thanks for the tip.
 
escaudio

escaudio

New Member
Just got my first Dendro!! I was wondering how often to feed. I think I will go for once a day to try and hurry the growing!! Thnks for the great article!
 
king_neptune

king_neptune

Active Member
Originally Posted by ESCAUDIO
http:///forum/post/3256023
Just got my first Dendro!! I was wondering how often to feed. I think I will go for once a day to try and hurry the growing!! Thnks for the great article!
Bad Idea. I didnt understand how the metabolism of these creatures work. They dont need to be fed more than a few times a week. I got the most significant improvemnt when I followed the advice a few posts up. I now feed 2x a week, and just about half of what I was giving before. Instead of 2x daily with as much as I could stuff in. Its now doing really good, and is only getting better! I cant wait for it to get back to the same level it had the first week I brought it home.
Feed yours every other day, or at least just a tiny amount(1 or 2 mysis per head) if you have to do it daily.
 
king_neptune

king_neptune

Active Member
Head #6 is just now beginning to sprout!
I moved him to a shaded area in much gentler water flow. Still feeding 2x a week, random stuff.Hell eat just about anything.
Fish eggs are something I been experimenting with. Rods fish food has them for $10 a pouch. Good results...but pricey!
 
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