Show off those elegance corals!

[redeyejedi]

I'm really considering getting an elegance coral. I've been in the saltwater hobby for just a little over 3 years now, with 2.5 of those years keeping coral. The first time I talked to my LFS and they said I could keep coral, my eyes lit up. My first coral was a reverse stem branching hammer. I got in the hobby for the fish, I stayed in it for the coral (still love the fish). One coral I've always thought was super cool, but never pulled the trigger on is the elegance coral. Show me your best pic of your elegance coral to hype me up/convince me to take the plunge. Any advice on care is appreciated too.

BONUS: I want to get a pink tip and gold/yellow tip, so likes will be given to every pic of said variants.

My beast

 

[claudio wagner]

I do not know exatly the type, but is one of my favorites corals. It combines metalic green, somewhat rose "tentacles" and purple tips. It honors the name!

 

[coral408]

This elegance coral becomes a playground for these anemones!

 

[Oregon Grown Reef]

This elegance coral becomes a playground for these anemones!

Happy and FAT coral. Wow. Do you spot feed it?

 

[rkpetersen]

Some worker at a lfs told me 15yrs ago that these were hard to keep and almost always die over time. That stuck with me and I've never bought one. Are they any harder than other lps or sps corals?

My experience is variable. Many years ago, I kept them easily, no problem, under metal halides. When I got back into the hobby more recently, I just couldn't keep them alive. One after another, they'd first contract into their skeleton and then lose tissue and die. While other corals were doing fine. I sought answers but as often the case in this hobby, definitive answers were nowhere to be found.

I found older articles about Elegance Coral Syndrome, and if you search this forum you'll find my thread on the topic. No solid answers there either. I had reason to think that individual corals with a conical base, typically from Indonesia, and typically from lower current habitats, might be more likely to arrive with ECS. While frags taken from a larger colony, typically from Australia and typically from higher current areas, were more likely to be healthy. However, some people discount this, and there are examples of conical bases Elegance corals that have done great, so as usual it's impossible to know the actual truth of the matter.

I believed it possible that the alleged organism that allegedly causes ECS had gotten into my tanks! So I stopped trying to keep Catalaphyllia jardinei. But then sometime later, I saw what were advertised as bulletproof Elegance frags, got one and to my amazement it has done really well. (Please see my previous post in this thread.) Many things had changed, so I'm not sure if the ECS organism, if real, was now gone, or if it was something else, like adding T5 bulbs to my LED lights. I later added two elegance corals from different sources to a different tank, and they've also done fine.

All of my elegance that have done great are the squared-off frag type, not the conical base type. Again, I have no proof that this makes any difference, just anecdotal experience. All the conical base ones I bought died, but one of the ones that died on me was the frag type, so at the very least that difference is not the whole answer.

 

[coral408]

Happy and FAT coral. Wow. Do you spot feed it?

Thank you! Yes, I spot feed it 3 times/wk with Reef Roid.

 

[John Fargher]

Clowns love it

 

[Oregon Grown Reef]

Thank you! Yes, I spot feed it 3 times/wk with Reef Roid.

What's your nutrient removal method? I know Reef Roids is infamous for spiking phosphate.

 

[John08007]

New addition actually, 24hrs in

Is that zoanthids growing in your sand? Are they attached to a rock under the sand? Never seen this before

 

[Reef and Dive]

Love this coral!

Most recent update:

 

[John Fargher]

Actually those are a small club of nuisance palys that I glued to a rock to see if they will grow and I can give away.

 

[coral408]

What's your nutrient removal method? I know Reef Roids is infamous for spiking phosphate.

I use 1/4 tsp each time for whole tank, spot feeding to individual LPS and zoas.
Phosphate range ~ .08- .25 using Phosphate Rx to control.

 

[Oregon Grown Reef]

Love this coral!

I love that structure! Once the corals grow in, you can throw some low light corals below.

 

[Sharkbait19]

Got this on sale at the lfs on Sunday. It was a total steal!!

 

[Steve Marshall]

 

[Oregon Grown Reef]

Where did this one come from?!? I'm leaning towards the neon body elegance.

 

[zaidalin79]

Here's an Elegance I picked up a couple years ago from Cherry Corals. I was having problems keeping them alive and his were advertised as 'Bulletproof Elegance'. It was just a one inch frag. But it's done incredibly well and grown like a beast, now about 8" end to end. It's got a resident crab and sometimes a canary blenny likes to lounge amongst its tentacles.

And here are a couple of smaller ones, side by side, in a different tank. They're a bit more secluded and not out front like the other one.

You can have two touching each other?

 

[zaidalin79]

I have 2. Both Aussie, one pink tipped, and one purple tipped. Hard to photo as they are under overhangs in very little light.

Pink tipped:

Purple tip thats quite a bit smaller and quite PO'ed here as my wrasses always seem to dig it up:

They don't mind being together?

 

[rossroams]

Won’t ever keep one again probably. Had a sweet 50$ pink tip elegance (apparently Aussie) and it was fine for a month or so before tissue retraction, shortened tentacles, and slime being excreted. Tank was 1 yr established already keeping LPS, softies, and one hydnophora pillosa. Strangely the elegances at the store were in 20+ nitrate water and my take stays unreadable. I’ll stick to my fox coral, it’s close enough to the elegance.

 

[NKYReefGuy]

Not the best picture. Very yellow in person.