New SPS

So I finally decided to pick up the ORA Red Planet for $27! Good size frag/colony too. Unfortunately, I am so anal in placement of my corals and trying to make things look natural while minimizing glue/putty, that I ended up handling the coral way more than I wanted too and broke off a couple small tips while also accidentally breaking the fragplug off of the base. I finally got it placed using more putty than I like and just hope it recovers well and doesnt die due to me poor handling. Will post pictures tomorrow hopefully there will be some polyp extension.

How much do you guys handle your corals when introducing them to your tank? I feel like I am way to hard on all of the ones I place

 

Well after a few hours the polyps are poking their heads out. Still not fully extended but at least not completely closed so I have hope, guess all I can do is wait for it to fully acclimate and see what happens

 

I have been pretty rough with mine in the past, like grabbing it and breaking the main colony off the base rock. It can take a lot of abuse. What it does not like is too much flow directly in front of a power head.

 

Good to hear. It does not have a PH right at it bit there is a 750 a few inches above it where it gets the flow bounced back off the front bowfront glass back at the coral so I may need to adjust. Can I just assume if I dont have full polyp extension within a few days then there is too much flow and I should readjsut the PH?

Also Corailline, I know you have had luck with this coral, how much light is enough for this guy? Only under a dual bulb T5HO fixture with good bulbs, maybe 6-8inches from surface maybe 5 inches from the end and dead center of the fixture which is only 1-2inches above the water surface. THinking of upgrading to a 4 bulb unit or adding a secondary LED strip

 

You might want to move it down for a couple weeks.

If you want a green base keep it low, if you want no green and just red keep it high.

Check at night for the most intense PE, too much flow and it will show noticeable decreased PE IME.

What lighting type did it come from and what is it's coloration now?

A hardy corals but once it bleaches it's a slow return.

 

It was in a 40breeder on the sandbed under an LED light. I believe an Ecotech Radion. I am colorblind but it looks pretty much all red to me, going to post picture tomorrow. I would like to keep it the brick-red it is now with maybe a little green in the base. Im also hoping it encrust pretty quickly and grows up a little bit before tabling. Not sure how fast it will grow, since Im startign with a decent sized piece Im hoping it gets a firm attachment in a month or so and takes off from there.

He has had it in store for about 2 weeks and it came from a large mother colony from a customers tank who had original ORA RP, not sure what kind of lighting he had though.

Do you really thinking I should move it down even though tis jsut a dual bulb T5 HO fixture? I was afraid it wouldnt get enough light where it is being an acro.

 

Just watch it for bleaching.

It's probably fine right where it is.

Mine took months to encrust the rock.

 

Pictures as promised, first two are right after placement and then the others from 12hours later shortly after lights came on. Last picture is to show placement the PH is a 750gph Hydor

 

What kind of lighting do you have? Your purples pop and your coraline is growing in huge disks.

 

I have an Aquaticlife dual bulb T5HO fixture with 1 14k giesemann bulb and 1 aquaticlife 420/460 blue bulb. Plan on changing it to an ATI Blue+ once my LFS has them back in stock. Do you like the purples popping like that? Im colorblind and dont see it but my wife tells me the whole tank is purple lol

I kind of like the color of my tank I thought coralline always grew in disk like that. They started out as several small disk and as they have gotten larger many of them have linked together to become large irregular patches. Im thinking in time they will just cover the whole rock, tank is only 8 months old setup with dry rock.