How does feeding you tank effect the color of your corals?

[padilla95624]

I make my own food and freeze it in cubes until I need it. The corals seem to color up better when I add dark colored veggies like carrots and broccoli as well as different seaweeds. Increased lighting helps as well by turning them up, removing glass covers and maintaining clean water.

 

[ArtsyFish]

unsure

 

[SaltwaterandLime]

Fully admit to all being new-ish, but so far I've found that the amount I feed has more effect on color than WHAT I feed does. When my nutrients go up, things start to go brown.

Light also seems to shift things more than feeding. I have multiple nano tanks and I often put frags of the same coral in multiple tanks. I feed the same, water change the same, but have better lights on some than others and frags from the same mother colony will shift different depending on light spectrum.

 

[Cjeippert]

PE mysis ticks off my acros more than any other food. I do not know why. Maybe its because they are FW shrimp.

Interesting. I noticed when I feed PE mysis, my acros respond with those thin white tentacles coming out more than anything else I feed my tank. I assumed this response meant they liked it‍??

 

[Dolphins18]

Interesting. I noticed when I feed PE mysis, my acros respond with those thin white tentacles coming out more than anything else I feed my tank. I assumed this response meant they liked it‍??

Mine do the same. I prefer they don't do that, but not sure if it's really that bad. I think they are called mesenterial filaments.

 

[onlyfans]

Coral, fish, or any other inhabitants are obviously going to be directly effected by the foods we feed them, to include the their color pigments and the symbiotic bacteria. Fresh live food is best, like pods and the four different types of common saltwater phyto. I've noticed faster growth, healthier flesh, longer extention on tentacles, better coloring, etc, etc. Same with my fish. It's like how people with super healthy and beautiful looking dogs (meaning their natural coats) always feed them the best foods possible; or like how we as humans always do better when we eat like we're supposed to.

For these reasons are why I started my own phyto and pod farm and sale small amounts on the side when I have too much. Might even turn into a legit side business with how things are going.

 

[X-37B]

I only feed my fish in my 120.
As long as po4 is kept below 0.1 and no3<5 my colors are as good as they get, imo.
A couple recent pics.

 

[kenchilada]

Might as well change poll question to “are you a liar?”

 

[mindme]

Food - never. Honestly, I'm not even sure what it could change. I personally don't feed my coral directly either, I only feed the fish. The exception of sorts to this is I will sometimes add in some amino acids, and while I can't say anything color wise, they definitely react when I add it to the water. Fully extended tentacles etc. they sometimes do that anyway, but hey always do it when I add amino acids.

I have to wonder if it's not the food, but something in the food because of what I'm about to say below:

Trace Minerals - EXTREME difference. I do not do water changes, and the amount of trace mineral usage kind of took me by surprise at first. I had multiple corals brown up. I had 1 coral, a cyphastrea, that not only lost it's color, I thought it was 100% dead. If it not for me being lazy and it not really being in a noticeable spot, I probably would have removed it. I just accepted it was dead. I can not stress how dead this thing looked, as in bare rock looking dead.

I had a montipora that I though the same thing of, but it seemed to be hanging on by a thread. Many, like my zoa's, never seem to care about trace minerals. Others just start to turn a little brownish. It varied by coral.

After doing a mail in water test, I found my trace elements were low or 0, so I of course fixed the issue. Many of the brown ones colored back up within a week. The cyphastrea I thought was dead seemed dead for 2 or 3 months. Then one day I looked at the tank and saw a single orange polyp. The base was still looking really dead, and nothing else showed signs of life, but here was this orange polyp sticking out months later. Couldn't believe it.

Fast forward 4 more months, and now the frag is back to what it looked like originally. slowly the polyps around the single one started to come back. The more came back, the more it seemed to speed up. I was wondering if it would have to grow over the existing coral, but the answer is no, those parts just came back to life. Now it's started encrusting the rock around it.

All because of some trace element that it was missing. Meanwhile, as I said, other coral were thriving the entire time.

 

[OU812Reefing]

Reef fuel 6 ml every other day and reef revolution twice a week

 

[ectoaesthetics]

Zeovit aminos (plus Phols extra) has been unreal. I use WAAAAY less than I was using of brightwells wity better coloration in my LPS and zoas

 

[Ef4life]

All my corals are pretty decent looking, not the best colors on some sps, but not bad at all. But The pink Cadillac always had really white tips, like almost bleached looking about 1/2” down from the very tip. But the coral is still looking healthy and it’s been that way a long time and growing.

until 2 days ago, I forgot to empty my skimmer and it all overflowed back into the tank, that pink Cadillac has never looked better now. Tips are no longer white, they have good color now. I also had an algae bloom on the glass too, but that’s no big deal really

 

[WallyB]

After years, and I mean 2 decades, of doing all kinds of coral feedings and I tried everything under the sun (Liquid Foods, Powder Foods, Aminos, etc) what I learned that feedings certainly can improve coloration especially SPS, but it's not worth it, since all feedings (unless very minimal, not often and only targetted) end up with Tank Problems. Usually Algae blooms or Cyano blooms, or both.

Problem for me in the past is as soon as I saw Coral Color improvements, I would just keep adding more and more often. Hard to resist the tempation. Certainly I know I have a problem with the Coral Food Overdose addiction.

The only additive that never gave me issues was Phols's extra (proper # of drops). It brightens up corals. Amino's for me were the worst for fueling Cyano. Still battling Cyano after a year, and I can't get rid of it after doing amino's for a few months.

Nothing is better then feeding fish your fish, and fish poop feeds your corals. The rest is just proper lighting.

 

[chayes991]

My scolly changed drastically when I started feeding reef energy. Though I stopped feeding the reef energy as it was causing algae issue the scolly retained that colour and I continue to feed it frozen once per week. Obviously the second photo is in blue light but you get the idea

 

[Scottsquatch]

In days past, I noticed it gave them that little bump that they just didn't get from light alone. I'ts been quite a while since I had corals though, so I'm not sure if all these fancy new lights do the trick on their own now.

 

[Cabby James]

I haven’t been able to find AF life source anywhere! mind sharing the link where you got it from?

Very Nice, I have 2 duncan's one is green 3 head and the other is Blue 4 head. Both are only about 2" but open like a big bunch of flowers and you can't even see the base! Food and lighting is why my color's are vivid, Good Luck CC!!!!! Sorry no recent pictures of Zoas but my tank is doing very well!

 

[christianscorals]

Well, I have a max nano, so a small system and my sump is in the back -- 20g total. I was dosing the full amount weekly into the display over the return nozzle and my fish were not tolerating it -- lots of irritation and flicking. There was silt and mud everywhere -- all over the rocks and sand, filling up my skimmer and filter socks daily, and when I went to change out my carbon the bag was caked with mud. So I did a few water changes and dialed it back w/the life source. No issues since.

thanks for the info! happy reefing.

 

[SaltyRNFrank]

i feed my Scoly and Cyarinas directly , Coral Feast , Reef Chilli Powder , and small marine pellets ( 5 to 10 ) depending on size of coral about once a week . I experimented on not feeding and all their tissue shrunk up, poor coloration after a month of not feeding. SPS , LPS and Softies get the left over or floating around coral feat / chilli powder .

weekly 10% Tropic Marine changes religously.
The corals really got brighter, more puffed up when switched from Fritz Salt to Tropic Marine Pro Salt .

235 Main / 40 Sump _ 3/4 full

 

[SaltyRNFrank]

i feed my Scoly and Cyarinas directly , Coral Feast , Reef Chilli Powder , and small marine pellets ( 5 to 10 ) depending on size of coral about once a week . I experimented on not feeding and all their tissue shrunk up, poor coloration after a month of not feeding. SPS , LPS and Softies get the left over or floating around coral feat / chilli powder .

weekly 10% Tropic Marine changes religously.
The corals really got brighter, more puffed up when switched from Fritz Salt to Tropic Marine Pro Salt .

235 Main / 40 Sump _ 3/4 full

i feed in the AM between 0600 to 0900 hrs

 

[Jupiter]

I only feed my fish in my 120.
As long as po4 is kept below 0.1 and no3<5 my colors are as good as they get, imo.
A couple recent pics.

Wow! wish my tank looked like that!!!!