Feeding open brain coral

[bighabeeb]

Suggestions on how this should be accomplished? I know it has a "mouth" like thing in the middle, but I'm not entirely sure how to entice it to eat. Do I just lay some thawed mysis on it and let it do it's own thing, or do I need to knock three times or something to get the feeder tents to come out and grab it?

(obviously the knocking is tongue in cheek). I read on another site someplace that you should squirt it with some kind of "juice" to get it ready to eat, but unfortunately the article didn't go on to say what that particular juice was - I wouldn't imagine corals have much of a taste for OJ?

Thanks!

 

[kay-bee19]

Many LPS corals extend their feeder tentacles at night.
I would feed my LPS corals (to include open brain and lobed brain corals) after the tank lights have been off for a while because most of them extend their feeder tentacles at night.

PE mysis shrimp would be my food of choice. After thawing it and rinsing it a few times in RO/DI water I'd pass the shrimp to corals using tweezers. As soon as the mysis shrimp made contact with their feeder tentacles they would grab the shrimp from the tweezers and direct the food to the oral cavity (the 'mouth'). Other hobbyists use turkey basters or similar means to deliver food to corals (I used tweezers to ensure every mysis shrimp was seized by the corals).

Every now and then there would be a coral or two which didn't have the feeder extended but once they sensed the mysis in the water they would go and extend their tentacles (cyclopeeze also worked well to get them into feeding mode). For my set up I would turn off the protein skimmer and circulation for about an hour.

Small green open brain eating krill

 

[Mpfaff77]

My brain was my 1st coral and have had it for 6 years. It has doubled size and hardly ever direct feed. I figure he gets enough thru regular feeding in tank. I do also feed live phytoplankton once on while after lights out as well as rotifers. I have in past when feeding tentacles are out I have given cocktail shrimp from supermarket to it. Only few times and very small piece about size of a dime. It has also became a host for my clowns.

 

[bighabeeb]

Great tips, thanks y'all. I picked up some mysis today and will try feeding in a week or so (long story short, had a large tattoo done on my dominant arm yesterday, and the idea of sticking it into salt water...well...yea, doesn't sound like a good idea until it's healed a bit)