Orange Tree Gorgonia

[SquishyFish]

As a few of you know, I picked up an orange tree gorgonia the other day. It was about 2ft across...even in my tank it was too big. So, I fragged it. All is good except for the places I touched it...the "skin" is coming off. It seems to have stopped receeding and looks good in the tank now. I was able to get about 6 large frags out of it.

Does anyone have any experience caring for these. I did my research, but none of the sites I found gave info on how to care for them. They all said "non-photo synthetic, advanced keepers only." After I saw that it was peeling, I called Garf..I actually got the director of their research dept. He was very helpful and I will obviously follow his advise, but I was wondering if anyone here has had any experience with them?

Squishy

 

[reefrunner69]

The only thing I can tell you is alot of waterflow and lots of food. I would look towards meaty planctonic size foods, cyclop-eeze and some minces sweetwaters might work pretty good.

 

[SquishyFish]

Right now I am feeding blender mush (scallops, prawns, salmon, cod), mysis, mixing cyclops-eez, powdered spirolina, and Dt's. I was told by the guy at Garf that I should add in Reef Plus into the mix. All of that is fortified with Selcon, Vit C, and Garlic Xtreme.

 

[mrmarine]

Can i get a frag? Im in texas and sounds like a nice coral
good luck with whatever hes doing

Mr. Marine

 

[reefrunner69]

Sounds like a good mix, I am not familiar with Reef Plus, so can't comment there, but I think the food you have is a pretty good start, I would definitely target feed these guys a couple times per day, cutting back if you experience algae issues.

 

[lando]

I have a purple tree gorgonia. I have had it for months and it is looking great. They prefer low light so place it in a back corner or your tank. They also need strong current so make sure you a PH close by. As far as feeding, I feed DT's for all of my filter feeders and the usual, algea, squid, shrimp, and flake for my fish. It seems to do fine with that providing the current carries the food to it. It's polyps will usually come out at night or in the morning when the lights are off. When i see mine fully open I do a special DT feeding once or twice a week. Just one more cool thing to observe. Good Luck...Lando

 

[SquishyFish]

Reef Plus is basically Amino Acids. I picked up some more DT's as well as the Spirulina and Reef Plus. It has some initial die back (minimal) but all seems to be well now. Thanks for the imput guys.

Mr. Marine...Let me get it established first, then we'll talk