Dendronephthya & Scleronephthya aquaculture

[Dr. Dendrostein]

Well, at least I know I haven't been doing all this for nothing.

Flow was one of the first things I figured out. It really loves it's flow. The pump in the photo is set to pulse and is reflecting off the glass right in front of it. I also figured out it hates light so I lowered my tank lights a bit and I have a light diffuser (piece of construction paper) placed on the glass brace that runs across my tank above it so it really only gets light reflecting off the glass.

So far I've been feeding it 2 times a day on weekdays and 3 times on weekends. It seems to like to eat more after lights out though, or I could be wrong. As for food I've been turning off my return pump and dosing Polyp Booster and Red Sea part A and B, then I wait about 20 minutes and broadcast feed a Phytoplankton/Zooplankton filter feeder mix food mixed with Reef Roids. I keep the return pump off for about 30 minutes with just the power heads running.

So far nutrients in my tank have been kept in check. I have 7" Klir filter, 3 Xport Bio Bricks on top of a layer of Matrix rock, a Red Sea Reefer 600 protein skimmer that's 5X oversized for my tank, GFO and Bio pellets and I dose Nopox nightly and Phospat-e if it needs a little help.

Is there anything else you can suggest?

I sort of purchased this without knowing what I was purchasing because my wife loved it. And the LFS guy said it was easy, like a mushroom coral.

It's only been a week but it does seem happy. Not that I'm a coral whisperer or something, but you can usually tell if something is going down hill. In the store it looked more like a clump of pink broccoli and it stayed that way for a day after I got it home. But now it's opened up like a tree and it's surprised me how big it actually is.

Sorry for the ramble but until I found this thread I thought I was screwed. My wife loves it and is way more receptive to me purchasing whatever I need for the tank to keep it alive, where she used to complain when I needed more salt.

Read my thread throughly, the info here not set in stone, if you figure something better great. I'm just showing everyone to the door, they need to open it.....haha don't forget, follow the white Rabbit too.....Hahaha.

Thanks for kind words, flow will be key, if you still have for over 1 year and looks same or better. Your flow is perfect. Foods, they're pigs, they eat anything, I think. Please make habit put photos here to see progress. Here's a photo of FB member, Exclusive Corals. Coral from Tonga.
Thanks for sharing

 

[Slingshot357]

Started reading though the thread today. "Dendra" (that's what I named her ) opens and closes up to 2 times a day. Maybe it has something to do with processing the food after it eats/when it's full? Just guessing. It defiantly closes every night around the same time and opens up slowly by about noon.

Day 10 and it's still looking good.

Edit: Forgot to mention, I ordered a line of foods from Brightwell Aquatics that I'm going to try. PhytoChrom, Zooplanktos-M and PhytoGold-M. I'll see if she likes them.

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

Started reading though the thread today. "Dendra" (that's what I named her ) opens and closes up to 2 times a day. Maybe it has something to do with processing the food after it eats/when it's full? Just guessing. It defiantly closes every night around the same time and opens up slowly by about noon.

Day 10 and it's still looking good.

Edit: Forgot to mention, I ordered a line of foods from Brightwell Aquatics that I'm going to try. PhytoChrom, Zooplanktos-M and PhytoGold-M. I'll see if she likes them.

Dendra and the Beast , somebody be the matchmaker, not me......haha

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

Started reading though the thread today. "Dendra" (that's what I named her ) opens and closes up to 2 times a day. Maybe it has something to do with processing the food after it eats/when it's full? Just guessing. It defiantly closes every night around the same time and opens up slowly by about noon.

Day 10 and it's still looking good.

Edit: Forgot to mention, I ordered a line of foods from Brightwell Aquatics that I'm going to try. PhytoChrom, Zooplanktos-M and PhytoGold-M. I'll see if she likes them.

From all the reading I've done on these corals, they say slowly feed too much food at one time, not good for them.

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

Started reading though the thread today. "Dendra" (that's what I named her ) opens and closes up to 2 times a day. Maybe it has something to do with processing the food after it eats/when it's full? Just guessing. It defiantly closes every night around the same time and opens up slowly by about noon.

Day 10 and it's still looking good.

Edit: Forgot to mention, I ordered a line of foods from Brightwell Aquatics that I'm going to try. PhytoChrom, Zooplanktos-M and PhytoGold-M. I'll see if she likes them.

Thanks for info, Keep us posted on how goes with the new food, but they will eat almost anything seems like

 

[MixedFruitBasket]

Started reading though the thread today. "Dendra"

Glad to see you found Dr. Dendro!
If you can, take a picture of it closed up at night. I'd be curious to compare it to nepthea and litophyton. And if you can get some close ups of the polyps, that too would be awesome

 

[Slingshot357]

Glad to see you found Dr. Dendro!
If you can, take a picture of it closed up at night. I'd be curious to compare it to nepthea and litophyton. And if you can get some close ups of the polyps, that too would be awesome

I’ll take a picture tonight. It usually closes up the same time every night like clockwork. It’s always closed when I get up around 10am and fully opens by 12pm.

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

What shall we compare the kingdom of God, to a dendronephthya when it sprouts, it is one polyp but when full-grown it is a multitude of polyps.

Deep stuff guys........

 

[najer]

what do you have like a little micro weather system in there where the water is pure on top and as it settles down it's dirtier. Hahaha

The tank is 18 inches shallow just to make things interesting, an acro this evening!

 

[Surfandturf]

I didn't read your entire thread, but I have had experience woth this type of coral and it was not what I would call successful. There is some research availabe on trying to keep carnations alive in aquariums, and the research shows that it can be possible to keep them alive, but thriving is not an option. The fact is that these corals slowly starve to death and I feel that they do not belong in the aquarium hobby.

 

[MixedFruitBasket]

I didn't read your entire thread, but I have had experience woth this type of coral and it was not what I would call successful. There is some research availabe on trying to keep carnations alive in aquariums, and the research shows that it can be possible to keep them alive, but thriving is not an option. The fact is that these corals slowly starve to death and I feel that they do not belong in the aquarium hobby.

Lots of coral are hard to keep. Acropora were impossible till someone figured out how to do it and the equipment to do so became available. Also, as dr dendro and I are finding out, quite a few of these corals imported as dendroneptheya are not dendro. They are in fact photosynthetic litophyton or stereoeptheya.
Honestly, I think the biggest reason people fail with dendro and other NPS is because we have been schooled to keep our nitrates insanely low and feed very little. You can't do that with NPS coral. They need food available in the water column pretty much all the time.
This also makes for unwelcoming conditions for other corals who do not tolerate high nitrates (as some claim). And that's another issue. We try to keep coral together that don't mix well. Ones that need drastically different care techniques because they lived half way around the world form each other in different water conditions.
Dr. Dendro is developing a way to meet their needs and find the optimum conditions for them to live in captivity. No it won't be easy, and yes there will and are losses, but he's making great headway. Dendro will not be a coral for everyone but those of us willing to maintain the needed environment will appreciate his work leading to success.

 

[najer]

I didn't read your entire thread, but I have had experience woth this type of coral and it was not what I would call successful. There is some research availabe on trying to keep carnations alive in aquariums, and the research shows that it can be possible to keep them alive, but thriving is not an option. The fact is that these corals slowly starve to death and I feel that they do not belong in the aquarium hobby.

That is a very sweeping statement, I get mine as my lfs imports from Vietnam, they come in as softies, acros are fully accepted as being "tricky" to keep, some people like to try and sustain these gorgeous animals that are just different?!

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

I didn't read your entire thread, but I have had experience woth this type of coral and it was not what I would call successful. There is some research availabe on trying to keep carnations alive in aquariums, and the research shows that it can be possible to keep them alive, but thriving is not an option. The fact is that these corals slowly starve to death and I feel that they do not belong in the aquarium hobby.

Very true, they use to say that for SPS

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

For everyone's enjoyment. Google Dr. Bruce Carlson, quote.
IT'S the Hobbiest and not the scientists who have contribute the most to success in marine husbandry(reef keeping) .

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

So everyone knows my inner thoughts and intentions this is what we're shooting for:

If God willing, in 2-3 yrs, if successful with these softies, we're going crowd funding, one project at a time, we want to provide a 50 gallon tank, with gyre's, feeding device, computer system to create proper flow, stand, and also 24 dendronephthya and scleronephthya with other nps corals, donate to one aquarium institution, after all expenses to rent truck,get all accessories together and any other expenses, funds left ,donate to them, then do it again, different Institution, and so on, eventually full on aquaculture, sell them to public, down the line.

This is the way it's done, so EVERYONE can enjoy first,,then.....

 

[Slingshot357]

From all the reading I've done on these corals, they say slowly feed too much food at one time, not good for them.

Thanks! I’ll need to rig something up to keep a decent amount of food flowing in the water column.

The only reason I’m trying the Brightwell foods is they are separated by size more than type it seems. 1 micron to 1k micron. The food I’m using now is just some mystery bottle of phyto I got off amazon.

 

[MixedFruitBasket]

Thanks! I’ll need to rig something up to keep a decent amount of food flowing in the water column.

The only reason I’m trying the Brightwell foods is they are separated by size more than type it seems. 1 micron to 1k micron. The food I’m using now is just some mystery bottle of phyto I got off amazon.

Got to algeabarn.com and buy the live phyto. It will remain in your water column alive and reproducing to some extent rather than dead preserved phyto that's often sold mass market. You will still have to re-dose daily, but it won't decompose like dead phyto.

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

Thanks! I’ll need to rig something up to keep a decent amount of food flowing in the water column.

The only reason I’m trying the Brightwell foods is they are separated by size more than type it seems. 1 micron to 1k micron. The food I’m using now is just some mystery bottle of phyto I got off amazon.

I like it that it's different Micron sizes, makes me want to try the one that's 1 Micron size food thanks for sharing I'm very tempted to try

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

Thank you everyone for the likes and comments. No comment is odd or wrong, I think. Hopefully we're all just communicating here.

 

[Slingshot357]

Here's a picture of it closed up. It looks more burgundy without the blue lights. Also I got 2 of the brightwell foods. They actually don't need to be refrigerated. Not sure if that's a bad sign or not, but at least I can hook it up to a dosing pump.