Placement of corals

[StartingInUtah]

I need some help deciding where to place the corals in my tank. Right now I have a few frags and I need to figure out where to put them. They are in my tank and acclimating well. They are opening a lot and look very healthy. The water parameters are staying good but I basically just put them in and need to now decide where to put them and how to do it exactly.

First let me ask how to get rid of the plugs exactly. I was told to scrape the frags off the base and stick them to a small rock using super glue. Is there any advice on that? Is there a special kind of super glue I need to use? How about a rock, is there a special type of rock? I was told that as an alternative to super glue I could tie them to the rock and in about a week I could remove the string as they will have attached to the rock. Is there any advice on how to do this or any special care I need to take while doing this?

Next I need to figure out where to place this coral. I need to know what ones to keep away from others, what ones need more light and more flow, etc. Here are the types of coral I have so far. I have two different frags of button polyps, 2 small zoa frags of different types, a ricordia mushroom, star polyps, a hammer and a pom pom xenia.

I also have a question about actinic lighting. I have a T8 fixture that I was given that I don't use as I also have a metal halide fixture. Can I put actinic bulbs in this T8 fixture it or is there a different fixture I need? Is there anything else I should take into consideration as far as lighting goes?

Thank you for all your help.

 

[54seaweed]

I always just stick the frag on the rocks with the plug as they will color up like the rock over time
sometimes the nipple on the bottom helps mounting in the rock work

if you decide to remove the plug use a straight edge razor at the base of the coral to remove use gloves and glasses when doing this , as for rock use live rock rubble , I like loc tite gel myself

button polyps spread fast always try to find a place where they can't invaid other corals

I always put mine up high and against back wall so they grow up rather than out, as for zoa's I always mount these low to mid tank some like more light and flow than others
mushrooms place in low flow areas basically around the base of rock

hammer likes low to med flow and mid tank placement is best

pom pom low to mid level med to low flow

those fixtures your going to need to replace bulbs every 3/6 months as needed and that gets expensive fast

I would invest in a good dimmable led light especially if you plan on adding any sps
over time

 

[StartingInUtah]

Thank you. Do I need to keep any of my corals away from others? What about start polyps?

 

[nelix10]

Polyps and zoa's can be close! What coral do you have?

 

[bribo12]

Star polyps can take over a tank. I'd isolate them on a rock away from other rocks.

 

[aadair22]

Glue the star polyps to the back of the tank glass and let them grow a field of green! looks cool

 

[mr_X]

If you decide to keep the metal halide fixture (I'm with 54seaweed on the LED recommendation), you don't need supplemental actinic. Do you know the wattage of your metal halide fixture and the color temp of the lamps?

 

[StartingInUtah]

I don't know about the metal halide right off the top of my head. The reason I'm asking about the actinic is because I want to hook something up to help my corals glow from time to time.

The corals I have are listed in my first message. I just need to move some around for visual appeal and needed some advice of where to place them. Thank you for the help.

Thank you

 

[BigRedsReefs10]

I don't know about the metal halide right off the top of my head. The reason I'm asking about the actinic is because I want to hook something up to help my corals glow from time to time.

The corals I have are listed in my first message. I just need to move some around for visual appeal and needed some advice of where to place them. Thank you for the help.

Thank you

Really need to know how powerful your lights are for that

 

[StartingInUtah]

I see. Thank you. I think I have a 175 watt bulb but I have no idea what you mean by color temp. If I'm thinking about it correctly it is 4000K. Please explain if this doesn't sound right.

Thank you.

 

[mr_X]

Hopefully that's 14,000k. Ok..so it's a 175 watt halide. How deep is your tank? All of the corals you have are medium light corals, but can be acclimated to higher light. Depending on the depth of your tank I would say you have moderate lighting, so basically anywhere you would like to put them, depending on flow.
As for the actinic supplement, You could use your T8 fixture for that. Put both fixtures on timers and have the t8 fixture run for the full 10 or 12 hours, or whatever your day is for your reef, then run the halide for 8 to 10 of those hours, so you will get a morning and evening simulation.

 

[StartingInUtah]

Great to know. Thank you. The coral that I thought were star polyps are actually called galaxia. Does anyone have any ideas about that one?

When you say morning and evening simulation what does that mean? Are you saying to turn on the actinic before and after the halide or just for a couple hours when the halide is not on?

Thank you.

 

[mr_X]

Those polyps you showed are not galaxia. they are commonly called yellow polyps.
galaxia are green and have a calcium based skeleton.
I'm saying that you would run the t8 fixture with the actinic lamp in it for say 12 hours, and about 2 hours in, you would have the halide come on, then 2 hours before the actinic goes off, the halide would go off. This would make a dawn and dusk simulation, sort of. It's not mandatory, but if you like the actinic look and want to view the tank a bit longer, this is how I would do it.

 

[StartingInUtah]

Thank you. The polyps I showed are not the ones I am talking about. I got some galaxia polyps now also.

 

[mr_X]

Ok...keep galaxia away from other corals as they are pretty aggressive.

 

[StartingInUtah]

I have a few more questions and I am going to split them into multiple posts on this thread. Here is my first question. I am looking into other options on lighting and I am wondering if I can get some advice. My tank is a 75 gallon tank. It is 36" long and 30" tall. If I were to invest in some LED lighting, what would I need for my tank? How much blue would I want? Would this take care of both the daytime and nighttime lighting? Is there a good option that is not too expensive such as LED strips or something like that? Do I need to have a certain amount of blue to white? I am trying to figure out what I want. Thank you for your advice.

 

[StartingInUtah]

My second question is if anyone can identify this zoa? The lighting is not great to bring out the colors but hopefully you can tell me from what you see.

 

[StartingInUtah]

My last question is help with where to place my corals in my tank. I would appreciate any advice and what I need to do to keep some of my more aggressive corals under control. Here is a picture of my tank and I would like to keep my rockwork as-is if possible. I like the way I have it set up. If not then I will move it how I need to. Also you will notice red and green algae. It is getting under control and there is about half of what there was about a week ago. I am also attaching a picture of all of my corals (which have just been put in to keep them alive until I decided where to put them). I do not have a picture of the Pom Pom Xenia either so please keep that in mind as well. I also have a piece of rock behind the tall one on the right that you cannot see in this picture. It is maybe an inch or two shorter than the one on the right.

Thank you again for all your help.




Hammer coral


Galaxia


Unknown Zoa

 

[StartingInUtah]

It would only let me do 4 pictures so here are my other three corals.

Thanks for your help


Button Polyps


Spiderman Zoa


Ricordea Mushroom

 

[Dav3]

Regarding lighting:

Just get two of these 120 watt dimmable led panels. http://www.ebay.com/itm/380924886455