Sps? Nps? Strawberry Carnation Coral

[findingAqua]

Hello,

Ive recently starting buying corals as im happy with my fish now and tanks nice and stable.

I bought this as a leather/soft coral:

After researching and seeing its most likely a carnation coral and the apparent doom it comes with I’ve decided to try and keep it alive since it was only £35 and so so pretty.


The questions I have after some research:

Do I need live phytoplankton or can I use dried as that seems easier?

Reef roids or benereef? (Ive read the latter is less likely to pollute)

Anything I can place in my autodoser to make it less labour intensive?

My plan atm is to install a feed hope above where it is in my tanks net top and target feed with the relevant suggestions.

My tank is a 425L red sea reefer 425 g2, i have a small wave maker behind it which currently blows just to the left, would it be more beneficial to direct this at it or would it be to strong?

Anything else you can add is much appreciated.

The only thing I can see being s problem is that theyre not a fan of light.. I run x2 maxspect jump blue lights on a peak of 60% for about 12 hours per day with a few hours ramp up and down at each end peak 60% runs for about 5 hours

TIA

 

[livinlifeinBKK]

It's NPS...I haven't heard of anyone keeping them alive for very long at all personally. They are very beautiful but we simply don't know how to properly care for them. When I go to the market I see tons of fluffy pieces like that and they're very tempting but we just aren't sure how to maintain them at this point. Do some deep digging and try though! Maybe you'll discover something new whether or not it makes it! I doubt he'll say different but maybe @ISpeakForTheSeas can offer some sort of hint. There was also @Dr. Dendrostein who may know something about them but I'm not sure. I feel like you're really going to have to do some experimenting here...

 

[ISpeakForTheSeas]

Dr. Dendrostein is definitely the one to talk to for this (I haven't had time to read through the 132 page thread linked below, but I know it contains some good info for at least some Dendronephthya spp.) - that said, I do know that the care varies from one species to another with this genus; with most feeding on phyto of various sizes, but at least one I know (D. australis) feeding primarily and with great success on zooplankton (Artemia, Rotifers, and powdered zooplankton were all used successfully with this species).

So, if you can figure out the exact species you have there, you might be able to figure out a specific flow/substrate for it, and you might be able to figure out what size of food is appropriate for it (which may not help you save/grow it, but it would be a good starting point to try at least).

Edit: Forgot to add the link:

Dendronephthya & Scleronephthya aquaculture

Riddle me this: humble was the fish, a beautiful and humble fish.

www.reef2reef.com