Best way to get zoanthids to grow

[blitzons]

stupid question but can i put medical grade iodine in my tank>

[awpong]

stupid question but can i put medical grade iodine in my tank>

 

If you dilute it. A lot.

[blitzons]

If you dilute it. A lot.

 

maybe ill just buy some reef iodine then

i dont want to accidently kill anything

 

thanks

[Dani3d]

wow, this is dangerous! you may overdose if you do not test for iodine. One drop per day is a lot.

 

Try dosing with Iodine. I dose 1 drop per day in my BC29 and the zoas have exploded in growth all of a sudden!

 

I feed mine with Kent Chromaplex and they grow really fast. Best food for zoanthids I tried so far.

 

 

They can sure do. Mine does as well when they are in growing mode.

 

You've never seen it, but it does happen.

 

LoL no way I have never seen ANY zoa or paly produce 2 polyps a week.

 

 

Red hornets grow very slowly. If you do grow zoanthids for a long time SURELY you must know that they have different grow rate depending on the specie and variety! Not just because some can grow 2 polyps per week, does not mean your hornets will do that!

 

So you are saying if I feed my tank reef roids my red hornets and soprano zoanthids will get 2 new polyps a week?

[steviejitsu]

My zoas don't grow. Some of my palys do though. My acans, chalice, and sps grow well.

 

I pretty much gave up on growing my zoas a while back. I sitll have some, but they stay constant or grow some and shrink some.

 

I think its partly because I keep a very clean tank with minimal feeding. I starve my inhabitants haha

[smitty_1280]

I have read that placing different colonies next to each other will promote growth as well. By placing them next to each other, they will compete for space was the principle behind this. Feel free to correct this information if it is wrong.

[blasterman]

I have these purple deaths in my 10 which are located on my sand bed and have only got 2 new plyps in the past 3 months

 

I've had trouble with both purple death and nuclear green growth. In fact, they didn't grow at all for 6months when I got the frags. My nuclear greens still grow very, very slow, but my purple deaths have recently been on a growth spurt. Iodine, and feeding them brine shrimp caused them to take off.

 

Both purple deaths and nuclear greens *love* frozen brine shrimp or baby brine shrimp. Just drop the brine shrimp to them through a straw and they should grab them up. They actually *learn* to feed this way and will soon become more aggressive and close up faster so fish can't steal the food. Acans love brine shrimp as well, so I can feed several corals at the same time.

 

Fasters growing small zoas in my tank are king midas. It's weird though because I have two colonies 8" aparts, and one grows crazy fast while the other barely grows at all. Current and lighting are the same.

 

Blue hornets I got melted away. However, a very similiar solid purple zoas I have is growing like crazy.

 

My gobstoppers grow so fast I no longer filter feed them.

 

Chemical warfare is a big problem with zoas, and might be a big reason why some colonies grow fast while other don't. *Any* time I zap a nuisance green implosion my radioactive dragon eyes and a few other colonies close up for two weeks. This proves that there's a lot of chemical triggering going on.

 

I use lugols iodine - one drop every other day depending on growth. I will happily bet a paycheck that the reason that some people claim that massive water changes spur zoanthid growth is strictly because of the iodine in fresh salt mix.

[scoobahSAM]

im not too sure but im reading alot of mixed information.. SO zoas/palys need prestine water parameters? Or slightly messy water and heavy feeding is suggested? Im so da confused man......

[JDK]

Fauna Marin ULTRA ZOA food. Have only seen it a cpl places. Cherrycorals.com is one of them.

 

http://www.cherrycorals.com/product.php?productid=3250

[blasterman]

*Pristine water* is subjective. If you feed your fish a lot of frozen food that they slop all over the place, and then do 20% weekly water changes, then your zoas and palys will likely thrive,

 

If however they are in a frag tank with no fish and never fed they'll stagnate.

[nhart608]

My experience: I bought a frag of Radioactive Dragon Eye zoas with 6 polyps 7 months ago, now have at least 40 polyps, they grew heartily right from the start. 2 weeks after my first purchase I bought another 6 polyp frag of Dragon Eye zoas, they now have 11 polyps and sit about 3 inches away from the RDE's. And they did nothing until I changed to MH lights about 3 months ago. Hard to figure what the magic formula is.

[blasterman]

Dragon eyes like a lot of light, that's for sure. Mine are as closer to my LED's than some of my acropora frags, and they still stretch.

[Red_Blenny]

Yup, depends on the zoanthid. I had my 2 head pink zipper for 4 months it hasn't grown a head yet. Eagle/Dragon/Cat eyes grow pretty fast. I figured the more expensive it is, the slower it'll grow.

 

As for feeding, I feed my zoas grinded up New Life Spectrum pellets in "Coralife Invert Target Feed" once per week.

[picoreef78]

Do nothing with them.

I feed the other corals twice weekly (spot feed)

Also twice weekly phytoplankon (which I might let loose in the direction of the zoanthids).

Keep water parameters stable.

 

I fragged mine three times and placed in other spots in the tank and they have all doubles in 2-3 months the number of polyps.

I need to think about getting frag disc and giving them or trading them away. Though I don't think I have anything fancy.

 

Good look and give them time, I am about 9 months out in my tank, 6 months after a major change and three months after a move to another state.