How balanced or lopsided is your reef tank?

Would you consider your tank to be balanced or lopsided when it comes to coral?

  • Balanced Mixed Reef

    Votes: 137 31.3%
  • Lopsided SPS

    Votes: 92 21.0%
  • Lopsided LPS

    Votes: 93 21.2%
  • Lopsided Zoanthids

    Votes: 34 7.8%
  • Lopdsided Soft Corals

    Votes: 63 14.4%
  • Lopsided NPS

    Votes: 1 0.2%
  • Other (please explain)

    Votes: 18 4.1%

  • Total voters
    438

revhtree

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I've always loved and always will prefer a mixed reef tank over any one type of coral dominated reef tanks. That being said sometimes without noticing my tank begins to shift or become dominated by one type of coral either because I've had better success with one type or I've started to like one more than the other. With that in mind let's talk about the coral balance of your reef tank!

1. Do you prefer one type of coral over the other and why?

2. If you were to break down your tank into a percentage graph what would the numbers look like?
(Example: 60% SPS, 25% LPS, 10% Zoas, 5% Soft etc.)

Top down farm tank from @WWC
IMG_0336 copy.jpg
 

Timfish

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Well, since I still have animals I've had since the mid 90s my systems favor corals that did well in 55 - 90 gallon systems with two to four T12 bulbs. Basicly what's just considered low light animals now. Losing a lot of animals in the freeze, this year will see the biggest shift to animals that do better with higher PAR levels.
 

Paul B

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I have no idea whats in my reef, where they came from, how much they cost or just about anything else and I can't remember the last time I bought a coral.
It's just a tangled up mess. :rolleyes:

 

elorablue

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Just a 2 month old 20g cube here....
6 softies - 2 Gorgonians, 1 Toadstool, 1 leather, GSP, Pulsing Xenia
2 LPS - 1 Favites, 1 Goniastrea
2 SPS - 1 Montipora Verrucosa, 1 Cyphastrea

So 60-20-20
 

littlebeard

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If we measure by the space the corals use up, my tank has some large hammers, so I would say Lopsided LPS.
If we go by species, it's probably about the same between sps and lps.
If we go by like say a scientific count of each coral animal like say each polyps then Lopsided SPS.

Question needs to be defined better!
 

Just John

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Have a smaller AIO tank ------> small AIO's are not good for sps-----> many lps (at least the ones I like) need to be spaced apart and the tanks is small ------> can't have lots of lps----> Zoa's have more color options than other appropriate corals ---------> 75% zoas
 
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Greybeard

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Revhtree... stretching a bit this morning?

Ratio of SPS/LPS/Softies/Polyps? Where, in nature, is this balanced reef you speak of?

Every reef I've ever seen, in person, or through video, tends towards similar types of corals... You won't find soft bodied corals mixed in among the staghorns at the reef crest (where they'd be torn to shreds), and you won't find acro colonies in the mud flats and tidal pools. Differing conditions make the balance you're talking about impossible in the wild.

I tend to go with types of corals I'm more successful with. Not looking for balance... just a healthy reef tank :D
 

A worm with high fashion and practical utility: Have you ever kept feather dusters in your reef aquarium?

  • I currently have feather dusters in my tank.

    Votes: 80 38.5%
  • Not currently, but I have had feather dusters in my tank in the past.

    Votes: 69 33.2%
  • I have not had feather dusters, but I hope to in the future.

    Votes: 26 12.5%
  • I have no plans to have feather dusters in my tank.

    Votes: 31 14.9%
  • Other.

    Votes: 2 1.0%
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