What happened to this coral?

[jefferythewind]

@Tired I spend time today learning more about live rock. As you all pointed out I did start with dry rock, and I haven't added anything more than what you see there. I ready about live rock and it seems pretty risky, with a chance of introducing some pests. However I like your idea of just sand of bits of something.

[jefferythewind]

Also just a question, do you think I should add more sand to the tank?

[Tired]

More sand won't help. You want a thin sandbed. The sand bits would just be to add life.

 

Live rock doesn't actually carry much risk, if you get it from a good source. The popular sources now don't have aiptasia, and other pests, though scary-seeming, are very rare. Live rock is the best way to get an established tank. It immediately puts your tank at a state of maturity and biodiversity that takes years for dry rock to reach, if it ever does. Some people who start with live rock never have algae blooms at all, which is unheard of with dry rock. 

 

The majority of microfauna isn't a hazard to your tank. Most of them are scavengers or herbivores, not predators, because that's how ecosystems work. There's pretty much more risk of harmful creatures and diseases from buying frags than from buying good-quality ocean rock.  

[jefferythewind]

@Tired Last week I was able to get a few small pieces of live rock from an old tank that the person was getting rid of. There was a lot of stuff growing on it: algae, small feather dusters, mushroom corals, and very deep purple/red i think coralline. My hermit crabs and snails really went to town on this rock and cleaned it all up pretty much over night. But still have 2 small feather dusters and the mushroom corals after about a week. Seems to be stabilizing. I also picked up a type of Japanese toadstool coral (purple) from a local guy selling a bunch of frags. Anyways overall the tank seems to be doing real well, the grass coral is growing very quickly now. I'll see how this goes for a few weeks. In the picture you can see the new rocks on the right and the new toadstool coral in the middle.

 

I really want to try an SPS coral that grows like a big tree but I will waiting for while before trying it. I think I need to learn more about adding supplements to the water. It seems looking around online people have good luck using supplements with SPS corals.

 

 

[Tired]

SPS corals use up a lot of calcium. You have to be careful not to let the calcium drop too much. Usually, that's what people are replacing. But if you only have a few corals with skeletons, and you do water changes fairly often, you can get by without supplements. 

 

Your "grass coral" is green star polyps. They grow VERY fast, and will grow over everything if allowed to do so. You may want to separate those rocks out from the other ones, so it can't grow over all your other corals.

[jefferythewind]

This is a 29 gallon tank and I change the water every Sunday, 5 gallons. Over the year since setting up the tank I have gotten much more disciplined about the water changes, for the last couple months I have been pretty much right on the weekly schedule. I think also my light can be slowly increased as the current level seems to be very low compared to the settings other people seem to be using.

 

Yes, thank you, the green star polyps took a while to grow off of their ceramic tile but since them have been expanding very quickly. You're right, I should start doing something to control them.

 

I've seem people on Instagram saying they only dose alkalinity. I've also seen a product from red sea that I think contains Alk, Calcium and Magnesium together. Also I've seen something about amino acids... Anyways still a lot to learn. Either way I am going to make sure the tank is stable for the next few weeks and look for good opportunities. I'm really happy with this Japanese toadstool. It is a big healthy coral for a small fraction of the price they want at the stores.