Does anyone feed your acan? And how often do you feed it?

I have a small acan frag and it has been on my sandbed for couple weeks now. It seems receding, I can see exposed skeleton more by day.

I dont spot feed it, but it eats mysis shrimp if it can catch one while I'm feeding my shrimp.

Today I move it onto my rock, hopefully it likes stronger light.

I feed my every day with mysis or cyclopezze. The exposed skeleton means its not happy with somehting in the tank. The acans should be full all day long and put tentacles out at night. What are you params or is something bothering it?

if anything the more light would piss it off even more.. try giving it less light like putting under a ledge where it doesnt get that much... i feed mine at night when the tentacles are out and i use any frozen food that is laying around. i hope they get better and if they dont you can always give them to me and ill help em out a bit

I would feed it ASAP.

I would feed it ASAP.

Acan is photosythetic and more light can only help them grow. I dont see it is a problem unless it is placed directly under a MH.

I dont have test kit for calcium, alk and mag. I do 25% w/c weekly.

I use a turky baster to spot feed it. How would you guys do it?

Your correct that acans are photosynthetic. However, they are very finicky especially under MH's. I had a 100+ acan colony that was in my tank for over 3 years. Re-scaped my tank and moved him only 2 inches higher up in the same spot and I lost all, but 10 heads. He wasn't even close to the top. Probably mid-level off center to the MH's and they bleached out and RTN'd. Took me a lot of TLC to save the 10 heads as I watched the rest of them just melt.

You probably should get some test kits or have your LFS test your water.

I just spot feed mine with my fingers. Wait till the feeder tentacles come out and hand them a piece or two.

Thanks for clarify that for me. What do you feed to your acan? I feed it with mysis shrimps and brine shrimps, so there is no way I can hold them by my fingers. I use a turky baster, but the food leaks out once it touchs the water and the food started to get blowing around before the it hits the acan. I just put food on top of its mouths.

I moved the acan to my top rock. I have 36" 4x39w T5 fixture. I will move them again if it's too much light for them.

One thing I have to say, many online article about "Acan Care" provide misleading and incorrect information. I bought Acan because I thought they dont require feeding. They are just like Sun coral that will wasting away slowly without spot feeding. Pissed me off!.

I feed my acans mysis every few days for fun but when I miss a week every now and again with no problems. I use tweezers and individually feed each head.

PE Mysis is fairly good size, so I could grab them with my finger. I also feed them pieces of krill and silversides. Just tear them into bite size pieces.

I tried to feed them with freeze dried krill. It says good for both fresh water and salt water. I presoaked the krill in my tank water for a few minutes. Then I cut the krill in smaller pieces, the smaller pieces were just floating around.

It seems the acans have some difficulties accepting the dried krill since it is a bit of dry and hardened. Have you guys tried to feed it with dry krill before?

I may look into frozen silver sides if it is availabe at my LFS or some pawn shrimp from the super market.

I've never tried to feed them tried krill before. Is that the shrimp you put in chinese soup? Prawns will work. Mine have also eaten pieces of salmon fillets and clams. They'll almost eat any meaty seafood.

The freeze dried krill is one of the fish food for sale in the LFS. I got it from my nephew since all his fish are too small.

Some people mention that Acan receding could have been caused by different reasons other than hunger.

Could low level of Cal, Mag cause this problem? Thanks

Absolutely, the calcium, mg, and alk could cause an issue for acans. They use the calcium to build their skeletons and the magnesium helps stabilize the alk and ca. Also, what kind of salt are you using? You want to use a reef salt with additional trace elements. I use Reef Crystals salt for water changes, but I also dose iodine and strontium. However, there are many people who don't believe in dosing iodine or strontium due to them being very toxic if overdosed. Best bet is to test your water and switch to a high grade reef salt.

Acans are also very finicky to placement and lighting. They don't like high light and will recede and bleach if they're pissed off. I leave all my acan lords in the sand bed, but my micromussa's like high light and are up with the SPS. Do you have any pics and where is it placed in the tank? What's your water testing? I've noticed that coral amino's also help them color up.

I have a 36" 4x39w T5 fixture and the tank is 20" tall. The acan has been on the sandbed for the past 2.5 weeks. I noticed the receding recently. I dont think T5 light is too strong for them.

I use instant ocean salt mix for my water change. I've heard IO salt is known to have low Calcium. I will get API master salt water kit to test for Cal, Alk.

I have two acan lords in my 29 under 4x24 T5's that will absolutely FRY if they are exposed to direct light. And I mean on the sandbed. I HAVE to keep them in the shade or they die, period.

You need to test for mag also.

I was having the same problem with mine under T5's. I moved them back a few inches and they have made a full recovery. They are not picky eaters. I turn my power heads off at night for 15 minutes for feeding.

I run MH's, so I'm not familiar with the T-5 setups. However, I know that my acans do best in a relatively shaded area or I have to move my light further back. I've seen guys entire collections bleach do to too much light on the sandbed.

Also, was it a healed frag or was it fresh cut when you bought it? I did lose a frag to a bacterial infection once because I bought it after it was cut with a dull saw. Caused some tissue damage that got infected a few weeks later.

Mine have issues with strong current. I’d recommend keeping them low in the tank with low flow, and good water changes will do them a heap of good.

I've moved them to the top of rocks, so they can be fed easier.

I will move them again to somewhere with much less light (maybe under the cave). Hope this will help.

So, low flow and low light, correct?

Yep, that'll be the best

sounds like the re-scaping caused a ammonia spike which killed your acans. moving it 2" closer isnt bad unless your tank is ultra low profile. less water in the way makes the light more effective.

when i first got him it was shipped. so i fed for a week straight and stopped. now its once in a while.
they grow pretty fast.

It seems like lack of feeding isn't the cause of my acan to recede as more people responded to my thread.

I keep my fingers crossed and hopefully it would recover once I move it to a more hidden location.

not meaning to hijack but you can feed just one or two polyps, right? Or do you have to feed each polyp on the colony?

i feed whatever catches the food. if the other ones dont, theyre sol til next feeding haha

I think it was the stress of moving it and my water tested fine after my re-scape. I do small daily water changes, so I never had a mini cycle after moving the rocks and corals. The only thing changed was the 2 inches, which increased the lighting and flow. I still can't figure out why it started RTNing because all of my other acans and corals were fine. Now it's sitting about 20" or so from my 150 MH's in my 95 gallon and it's colored back up and beginning to grow again. Here a pic when it first started to die off. It used to be a beautiful centerpiece for my tank. Sooo depressing...

http://i684.photobucket.com/albums/vv202/n...16/P1000367.jpg

My acan looks very pale and the whiteish covered polyps. I've never seen it fully open in my tank. I moved it to the sandbed at the corner behind a rock. Hopefully it will recover.

Who said acan is easy to care for???

If you're going to buy test kits, don't be cheap on the costs. Get some Salifert test kits or Elos. They are worth the money to spend.

I'm not quite sure how it is you even knew your cycle was over or if you were ever having any issues without having test kits. The first moment you noticed something wrong, you should have tested. If you are doing regular testing, then you would be able to notice a trend and make sure your levels are up to par.

Are you using carbon? Sometimes combination of intense light and carbon can cause corals to
bleach.