I want to share my experience with elegance corals that I've had since August, and my thoughts on acclimating, and how it reacts to supplements such as essential trace elements and calcium supplements and feeding.
So I've always been fascinated about elegance corals, and I might add that it's because of this particular beautiful corals that kept me going on reef keeping. Since starting my tank with a 29 gallon HQI biocube three years ago I have been persistent in trying to get elegance coral to survive more than two weeks in my tank.
What I found out that the HQI biocube's lighting is way too intense for elegance. No matter how hard I try to hide elegance under shades and indirect water flow, I never have any success with it. Like many aquarists and enthusiasts documented in numerous forum posts, none have survived past two weeks and at most a month at best before it withered and died.
I have since upgraded to a 66 gallon red sea max tank and been running it since July 2013. As usual I started with a pretty light bio load, then slowly adding one coral at a time in a two week increment, now to the point that my tank is completely full, with some fish.
I started with an indo elegance coral in last week of July in the partially shaded area. When it showed signs of "somewhat" happy, I would move it into a fully lighted area. Three weeks later I got an aussie elegance coral, again acclimating it in the same partially shaded area. See attachment 1. The one in the front of the tank is an indo elegance, and the one in the back is an aussie. Appearance wise, there was no difference. Both skeletons were pretty clean, although some aquarists have mentioned that indo elegance coral's skeleton tends to be darker.
The indo elegance never fully expand to its fullest. As you can see in attachment 1, this was two hours after I introduced the aussie, and it was OK, not completely happy, but nonetheless, somewhat expanded. The same day I offered both of them chopped fresh shrimp, and both readily took food and digested them.
However, a week later, the indo elegance started to retract and stop taking food altogether. But the aussie elegance have fully expanded in the shaded area and was very happy. Its tentacles were long and flowing.
When the indo elegance finally gave out and died, and the aussie elegance had expanded to the point where its flesh was pressing against my tank glass, I moved it into an area where I hope it would grow into. The same day I offered it more chopped shrimp and the next day, it expanded even more. See attachment 2.
Two days later, I left for a 9 day vacation, and something unfortunate happened while I was away. My carpet anemone decided to move into the area where I had placed my aussie elegance coral. When I returned, I found it distraught and had been stung by the potent carpet anemone. It was unhappy, but none the less still readily to take food from me. I decided to move it away from the anemone. And from then on, I prayed that it would continue to survive after it has been stung the crap out of it by the anemone, but it was an up hill battle. Day after day, it started to retract, and began losing its color.
Then I was plagued by the red slime cyno bacteria, resorting me to chemically treating my tank and constantly doing water change every 48 hours. And within 8 days, my carpet anemone died. Once my anemone was out of the tank, I moved the coral back to where it was. It was not happy due to the constant change in water change. My guess is each time I changed water, I also removed the beneficial bacteria as well...
... continue to next post ...
So I've always been fascinated about elegance corals, and I might add that it's because of this particular beautiful corals that kept me going on reef keeping. Since starting my tank with a 29 gallon HQI biocube three years ago I have been persistent in trying to get elegance coral to survive more than two weeks in my tank.
What I found out that the HQI biocube's lighting is way too intense for elegance. No matter how hard I try to hide elegance under shades and indirect water flow, I never have any success with it. Like many aquarists and enthusiasts documented in numerous forum posts, none have survived past two weeks and at most a month at best before it withered and died.
I have since upgraded to a 66 gallon red sea max tank and been running it since July 2013. As usual I started with a pretty light bio load, then slowly adding one coral at a time in a two week increment, now to the point that my tank is completely full, with some fish.
I started with an indo elegance coral in last week of July in the partially shaded area. When it showed signs of "somewhat" happy, I would move it into a fully lighted area. Three weeks later I got an aussie elegance coral, again acclimating it in the same partially shaded area. See attachment 1. The one in the front of the tank is an indo elegance, and the one in the back is an aussie. Appearance wise, there was no difference. Both skeletons were pretty clean, although some aquarists have mentioned that indo elegance coral's skeleton tends to be darker.
The indo elegance never fully expand to its fullest. As you can see in attachment 1, this was two hours after I introduced the aussie, and it was OK, not completely happy, but nonetheless, somewhat expanded. The same day I offered both of them chopped fresh shrimp, and both readily took food and digested them.
However, a week later, the indo elegance started to retract and stop taking food altogether. But the aussie elegance have fully expanded in the shaded area and was very happy. Its tentacles were long and flowing.
When the indo elegance finally gave out and died, and the aussie elegance had expanded to the point where its flesh was pressing against my tank glass, I moved it into an area where I hope it would grow into. The same day I offered it more chopped shrimp and the next day, it expanded even more. See attachment 2.
Two days later, I left for a 9 day vacation, and something unfortunate happened while I was away. My carpet anemone decided to move into the area where I had placed my aussie elegance coral. When I returned, I found it distraught and had been stung by the potent carpet anemone. It was unhappy, but none the less still readily to take food from me. I decided to move it away from the anemone. And from then on, I prayed that it would continue to survive after it has been stung the crap out of it by the anemone, but it was an up hill battle. Day after day, it started to retract, and began losing its color.
Then I was plagued by the red slime cyno bacteria, resorting me to chemically treating my tank and constantly doing water change every 48 hours. And within 8 days, my carpet anemone died. Once my anemone was out of the tank, I moved the coral back to where it was. It was not happy due to the constant change in water change. My guess is each time I changed water, I also removed the beneficial bacteria as well...
... continue to next post ...
lsmile: IME anyway...