Powerman's coral growth thread. (pic intense)

Wow dude. Amazing. I wish my corals grew, heh. I really need to work on my water params.

 

hey powerman do you know how a frogspawn is with a anemone? i love the frogspawns.

 

Thanks a lot guys. So as you can see with the Montis, not all grow at the same rate. The encrusting ones are a little slower. Idaho Grape is good.... now here is the real freak. Just some frag of Green Monti a guy gave me. It has the purple rim, looks good. Grows like a weed. I started with the frag in the pic above with the Idaho Grape at the begining of July.

Here it is in October



And here it is today



I was cleaning the glass and actually broke off a piece about the size I started with. So that is all what has grown in 6 months. The only reason it's sloped like that is because the power head is blowing across it. Or it probably would be taller.

 

So here are a few frags. I got them around October, so this is really the first quarter. Not a lot of growth on. They are all growing though, the first quarter is nothing too special, hopefully they will take off.



The Blue Acro on the left has not done one single thing. No growth at all that I can tell. Nice color though. You can see how much the Purple Haze has spread out from the frag plug. The GARF Bonsai has not done much. It was a brand new frag, so it has spread out on the plug and grown up a bit, but I really loved the colony so hopefully it will start branching out soon. The Superman Monti does not grow as fast as the Purple. It has just covered the plug.

Here they were as frags October 19



This is my Duncan from the same time.



Here it is today



And here is my ORA Purple Plasma. Not much now, but it is my favorite. I really love the colors. It is growing and I think it will take off.



And today

 

Hereis an interesting one. I got this Prizim Favia in July.



Just 3 heads. The frag has grown out and spread. But still has 3 heads. Now there seems to be heads growing out of the heads, instead of dividing like I thought. Not real sure at this point, but we will see what happens.



Here is a pic of my little two head Hammer I got fragged around Aug.



And here it is today.



Six heads. Night shot



I think that is about it now. I have some Acros but I have not had them 3 months. So I will get them in the rotation next quarter.

 

My tank thread is in the sig. All I can say is a big skimmer, lots of rock, a big skimmer, and a fuge and DSB.... all being taken care of by a big skimmer.

I feed the fish... the fuge is for the coral. I also feed DT's, Rotifeast, and Oyster Eggs by Reef Nutrition. Actually just started the Reef Nutrition stuff a month ago. Been DT's phyto up till then.

 

This is key to a soild tank...

one element you forgot to mention is dosing. I know you do your dosing... and probably have two/three part perfected.

 

Now that I have it dialed in and stopped chasing tests all over the place, it has been very stable.

Temp 79.3-80
SG 1.026
Ca 430
Alk 9.6
Mg 1250 -1300
Nitrates zero.
PO4 .02 or less. Just started running GFO a month ago.
Actinics 12 hours
Halides 6 hours
Moon lights off for 6 hours.

As you can see I don't try to stay at the upper extreme of the scales. Right in the middle is all I care about.

 

All looks well.

How close are you to figuring out your tanks needs for mg? thats the one thing Im struggling with. I have my mg bouncing a bit. I can get my mg to desired level of about 1300. then after that I struggle. I havent focused on that last leg of the three legged stool. Just need to learn when its at 1300 and I stop dosing it while my alk and ca are stable, how my mg reacts after dosing it. hope you follow what Im saying. which leads me to my next question.

I know you use brs elements. how are you dosing your mg? Hopin you can teach me something

 

Very nice growth, I love that favia, such vibrant colors