what should my first coral be

[pairenoid]

I have a 20L with a nova 2x24 10k,460 actinic
I have 1 clownfish, maybe 1 more in the future
future blenny
future goby
I only want extremely hardy ones, i love zooanthids and mushrooms and polyps

recommend a cheap and easy to take care of as my first one, i will be going to the fish store tom, hopefully will be back with one

I do not have the nova yet, its still waiting for replacement bulbs, but a hardy coral should be fine ~2 weeks without t5? afterall i hear they need minimal lighting to begin with.

if i dont buy it online how is it buying online? i know with fish they will die if its not overnight, but what about corals? i would prefer to buy online since they are so cheap on reefs2go, but not if i need overnight shipping

 

[obscurereef]

My first corals were zoas, mushrooms, torch, and chalices. The zoas and mushrooms are the hardiest. Xenia and duncans are also pretty hardy and grow fast.

 

[pairenoid]

thanks, i was hoping i could get more of a specific species or name that i can scope out, or can i just get what looks cool i like the neon color green ones and anything not bland brown lol

 

[Gregcoyote]

Unfortunately, a lot of the easy soft corals are brown. Zoas can tolerate tanks with higher nitrogen levels, mushrooms can too. LPS and especially SPS corals need very clean water in general, although a frogspawn wouldn't be too bad as a first coral.

 

[pairenoid]

hm ill have to look into the frogspawn

my main concern right now is how long they can live with t8's? i emailed current, but they still have not shipped my replacement bulbs and im raging lol

 

[obscurereef]

I think for the color, mushrooms are your best bet. Prob. hardier than some zoas. You don't want to just get coral and think that they are so hardy you should neglect the tank. Just see how the do and work your way up

 

[pairenoid]

thanks, turns out my lights are delivered!!!!!!!! i cant wait for tom, yay!

one more question while im here, where can i find a good guide on acclimating, fragging, etc

forgot to mention that i would like stuff i can add DIRECTLY on top of the sand, as my sandbed looks boring, but i do have a sand sifting conch T_T

man im going to spend the next few hours reading about this

 

[obscurereef]

Liveaquaria, bluezoo, other online fish stores have methods of acclimating. For corals though, it's best to drip acclimate for 1-2 hours or more depending on how hardy the specimen is or the difference of parameters. Fragging won't be for a while and there's no guarantee that the coral pieces that are fragged will survive. Just google or youtube it and you'll find a bunch of great results.

It's best to photo acclimate corals to get them used to their lighting and slowly move them up on the rocks if they require higher lighting. The conch shouldn't be a problem. If the coral does get sand on it just blow it off.