Coral Acclimation Process (Typically differs from recommendations)

[fadijohn]

I understand the coral acclimation process for the vast majority of people (including myself) involves floating the bags to get the temps matching, dip the coral, rinse in some tank water to get the remaining dip off, then place it in the tank. Jake Adams from ReefBuilders would often skip the dip phase and just plop the new corals in as seen in a few of his Youtube videos..

Why, then, do a lot of the coral farms we buy from (Tidal Gardens, WWC, Cherry Corals) have long and drawn out acclimation processes that they recommend?

 

[MossyFroggyLove]

I won’t dip my corals if the shop doesn’t recommend it. I would if they do

 

[MossyFroggyLove]

At least that’s me

 

[VintageReefer]

I understand the coral acclimation process for the vast majority of people (including myself) involves floating the bags to get the temps matching, dip the coral, rinse in some tank water to get the remaining dip off, then place it in the tank. Jake Adams from ReefBuilders would often skip the dip phase and just plop the new corals in as seen in a few of his Youtube videos..

Why, then, do a lot of the coral farms we buy from (Tidal Gardens, WWC, Cherry Corals) have long and drawn out acclimation processes that they recommend?

To be careful basically

to eliminate any pests that made it past their processes (eggs can survive dips so it’s possible they dipped, then by the turn you get the forks, the eggs hatched), and to make the transition from shipping to your tank more gradual on the coral.

 

[ryanjohn1]

Not dipping for pests is absolutely bonkers. Idk who it is don’t trust anyone.

 

[MossyFroggyLove]

Not dipping for pests is absolutely bonkers. Idk who it is don’t trust anyone.

I never dipped the corals that were bought from a person who didnt ask me to. But when I went to a new shop to buy corals, they asked me liked 50 times to dip the corals. But I still didnt dip them because I was stupid. Because of that I introduced like 5-10 fireworms which demolished my tank

 

[Bruttall]

My 2 cents of course.

It seems to me the Long Drawn Out acclimation is for when you have corals shipped and they stay in the same shipping bag and .5 gal of water for a week or more. We know with fish this drops the PH of the water and as soon as you add water with normal Ph the ammonia in the bag will spike harming or killing the fish,. I assume the same for coral that has spent a lot of time in a small shipping bag. Hence the long drawn out acclimation process.

What I do is really simple;
Fish I float the bag for 20 minutes and drop them into my tank. No QT!
( I QT at my LFS.) I do not buy any fish, and have not bought any for the last 14 months I did not observe for 2 weeks or more at my LFS. They have no prob letting me put a small deposit on those fish. I am pretty well known there. :)

Corals I don't float. I Live less than 20 minutes from the farthest LFS, so coral I remove from store bag, put into a plastic container I have and add Seachem Reef Dip w/ iodine, about 2ml per .5 gal of the water the coral came home in. After 15 to 20 minutes in the dip I remove and rinse with Tank Water just in case there are any loose thingies. Then into the tank they go.

After finding Vermatids, Asterina Stars and Aptisia in my tank, I DIP EVERY THING! I know I already got the invasives, what's the point now, but I still am religious about everything gets dipped.

Good luck to you.