Acclimating corals

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Ryan5

Aquarium Advice Regular
Joined
Mar 20, 2012
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62
Location
Terre Haute, Indiana
I have been considering for some time now and I think the time is right for me to start adding corals to my 50 gallon tank. I have never had corals before and I wasnt sure how to acclimate them to the tank. Any suggestions would be great!
 
Ryan5 said:
I have been considering for some time now and I think the time is right for me to start adding corals to my 50 gallon tank. I have never had corals before and I wasnt sure how to acclimate them to the tank. Any suggestions would be great!

I do a float in the bag to allow temp to adjust , then I take a shot glass and *** 1oz of water ever 10 min or so , emptying half after the bag is 2/3 full and repeat this 2-3 times , it seems to work for me , this is my new Kenya tree after 24 hrs
 

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Newfiereefer said:
I do a float in the bag to allow temp to adjust , then I take a shot glass and *** 1oz of water ever 10 min or so , emptying half after the bag is 2/3 full and repeat this 2-3 times , it seems to work for me , this is my new Kenya tree after 24 hrs

Thats not how i acclimate my corals... Whenever i get a new coral i try and do a coral dip to kill off any bugs or harmful critters on the coral, then i take my piece of airline tubing with a knot at the end and drip acclimate it for at least an hour. This is being on the safe side, many people just float. Wether or not you drip acclimate corals, you DEFINITLY need to drip acclimate fish.
 
Nu-Nu the eel said:
Thats not how i acclimate my corals... Whenever i get a new coral i try and do a coral dip to kill off any bugs or harmful critters on the coral, then i take my piece of airline tubing with a knot at the end and drip acclimate it for at least an hour. This is being on the safe side, many people just float. Wether or not you drip acclimate corals, you DEFINITLY need to drip acclimate fish.

I have never dripped my fish an have never had losses I've only had 3 loss's and they were murdered by my arrow crab >__< whome I've decide has to go !
The drip if anything I would think would be more important to the corals and inverts since they are usually more sensitive to water quality.
P.s i just haven't gotten around to getting a hose and jar for dripping :-/ another thing to add to the list :-/
 
I never acclimate mu corals. I just take them out of the bag and put them in the tank
 
I get home, put my hand in the bag, grab the coral and put it in the tank. Had no idea you were supposed to acclimate them, mine never seem to mind.
 
Newfiereefer said:
I do a float in the bag to allow temp to adjust , then I take a shot glass and *** 1oz of water ever 10 min or so , emptying half after the bag is 2/3 full and repeat this 2-3 times , it seems to work for me , this is my new Kenya tree after 24 hrs

Amen except i do only twice.
 
Okay...I am the conservative one I guess. I don't dip as I think that stress's the coral too much, but I do inspect it closely. I drip acclimate for at least two hours. Then depending on the coral, I place it in a temporary position to see if it responds to the flow and lighting. If its a SPS coral, I am very careful to shade the coral for the first few weeks, yes weeks, in the tank. They bleach very easily, especially when you are providing the PAR needed for established hard corals.
 
I drip acclimate my corals for an hour. I then acclimate them to the light by keeping them in the sandbed for a week before moving them up a level.

A side note that when i get coral from la's divers den, i have not acclimated to light. My birds nest loved going into the top of the tank after just a day. Id never seen such polyp extension right after being added to the tank, so up he went.
 
I personally drip acclimate everything for as long as possible. I also use a small heater and powerhead so I can temp match that way. I try to acclimate for a minimum of two hours. The exception is sps coral. I leave them out of water for 5 minutes then they go straight into the tank and start on the sand or close to and gradually move them up. The reason being that sps secrete a slime coating to prevent drying out at low tide. This slime seals them in and gradually dissolves off thus acclimating them.
 
I also dip my corals. I acclimate by adding about 1 -2 oz of tank water every couple minutes or so over 20-30 minutes mixed with a coral disinfectant. I then transfer to a container with tank water mixed with revive for about 15-20 minutes, then into tank.
 
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