Sun coral feeding

[moss]

I know this subject has probably been discussed before however, im new to sun corals, i have a small cluster that i have just bought living on a oyster ! now it hasnt opened at all in the 3 days ive owned it, do i feed it whilst recessed into the skeleton? will that convince it to open and feed, or do i wait untill lights out, and feed under darkness, i have today moved it to a home made cave, as i have read they like darkened areas.. is this correct? i mean i want to see the coral , not have it in a dark hole its entire life, but also wnt to have a happy sun coral.

http://i50.photobucket.com/albums/f346/benjaminshane/PIC_0001-3.jpg

and now in cave

http://i50.photobucket.com/albums/f346/benjaminshane/PIC_0040.jpg
:thanks:

[frosttelecoms]

When my sun coral was new I found that feeding my tank tended to bring the sun coral out. Now it simply opens at the same time each morning and evening.
I often place a plasic bottle over the sun coral and feed it through the top to ensure it gets a good feed. If not they can also be hand fed.

[sky1ine]

Hi moss hope your well.

Firstly thats a very very hungry sun coral by the looks of it. It can't be fed whilst the polyps are retracted. Have you tried feeding some cycloppeze to try and trigger the polyps to open? Tubastrea normally love that stuff.

If you haven't i'd run out and buy some - that coral needs food asap.

Whats the flow like where it is? Have you noticed anybody bothering the coral? Its strange its not expanding to accept food. Your sun will be needing moderate flow nothing too high or it will probably stay retracted.

As for putting it in the cave - it will make no difference what so ever. Its a myth that they have to live in dark areas. They live in dark areas because thats where there food is. Its worth noting that while light doesn't bother them - it can/will encourage algae growth over the skeleton so just make sure no excess food or detrius settles on the coral and it should be fine.

If it starts feeding it will need a good diet to thrive. Ignore brine shrimp (its pointless food that stuff) go with a mix of mysis, red plankton is very good i found too, any white fish, marine mix cubes etc etc etc. But i'd advise you to put some form of enrichment in the food.

Other than that, keep your water quality good, and keep trying to feed (not at the expense of your water quality though)

* i use seachem reef plus, to enrich my food, if i put so much as one drop in my tank - all my tubastrea open up within 5 mins - they love the stuff. It might be your best chance to get the coral to extend its polyps.

Hope that helps mate.
Marc

[dicky5ash]

Hi Mart,

I'm not an expert with these but my one is looking very healthy and I seem to have more polyps than I started with, which must mean it is happy.

I feed it every couple of days with RO washed mysis (as a means of reducing the amount of phosphate going in the tank), using a turkey baster.

You need to feed it when its polyps are extended otherwise it cannot take the food and fish are likely to take the food before it gets a chance. My one is closed 50% of the time during the day but opens up if I jet detritus off nearby rocks with my turkey baster. I find feeding it at night when there is less fish activity better.

The coke bottle trick works well to get them starting to feed, you might want to feed the mysis unwashed so that the juices help encourage it to extend once its got in the habit of feeding then you could revert to washing the mysis with RO to manage phosphate introduction.

These are somtimes not the easiest of corals to get started.

Rich

[lilyann]

I usually put cyclopeeze in the water first then when sun is fully open feed, i give mine ,mixed mussel ,cockle, krill and mysis, its doing great so far, also my beadlet nem loves it too.:)

LILYANN:p

[evilervin]

Hi Moss:wave:,

Too echo the above posts:)...

it hasnt opened at all in the 3 days ive owned it It is not usual for Tubastraea (sun coral) not to expand within this time frame. Harvesting, shipping, acclimatising etc, can cause the coral a great deal of stress, which as a consequence, will make it reluctant to expand ready for feeding…

do i feed it whilst recessed into the skeleton? will that convince it to open and feed Yeah, find of:).
Whilst the coral does expand of its own accord when ever food is ‘sensed’ in the water, your going to have to coax (or convince) the polyps into expanding by gently wafting / blowing a ‘smelly’ trigger over the closed ‘cups’ using a turkey baster or similar.
Its best if your ‘trigger’ doesn’t contain large pieces of meaty food which may pollute the tank if left uneaten. IME small amounts of products such as Cyclop-eeze or Coral Vibrance do this job very well. You can give the coaxing mixture a little bit more ‘zing’ by adding a drop or two of an amino acid product, such as Seachem Reef plus.
If you have no luck with simply wafting the ‘trigger’ over the coral you can concentrate the ‘smell’ by placing the top half of a coke bottle over the coral, and releasing the ‘trigger’ into the bottle (through the neck)

If the polyps are struggling to open, IE just the mouth appears or just the tips of a few tentacles, you can coax them further by very, very gently sticking a small piece of meaty food (***Not Brine Shrimp***) directly to the slightly exposed tentacle or mouth.

Once the polyps are readily accepting food (it may take anywhere from 1-2 days to a week or so), feeding will become a lot easier as the corals health improves. The polyps will expand fully making ‘prey’ capture possible, which mean you wont have to literally stick the food to the polyps, IE you can use the a turkey baster to release the food where the tentacles can ‘catch’ it, or use ‘top hat’ method (the cut down drinks bottle or ‘feeding cup’ available form some LFS).

Too further echo the above posts (sky1ine), due to the size of the polyps and the young buds which are evident, I would highly recommend feeding with red plankton (zooplankton), TMC’s Gamma red plankton (calanus sp) is fantastic, and i would also offer ‘blitzed’ (finely choped)white fish (haddock, cod, etc).


i have today moved it to a home made cave, as i have read they like darkened areas.. is this correct? There is no necessity to place the coral within a cave. The overriding factors to take into account are; the flow of water across the coral (to ‘slack’ and the coral want expand, and equally if the flow is too ‘hard’ or fast…aim for a moderate flow), and the ease of which the coral can be fed.
If you click the banner in me sig you will find more info on Tubastraea sp, also if you do a search on here, using the term Tubastraea you find lots of posts and further info.

HTH:)
Roger