"Sure thing" corals

[Peair]

Theres plenty of articles and youtube videos on this topic but many of them seem like they are made by someone doing it just for the ad revenue. So most of them are just rehashed info from other articles/videos.

So, I'd like to see what users here have to say on what corals are so easy to keep that them doing well is basically a sure thing. If you set up a tank for someone that never even kept a goldfish, with good lighting and flow and rock and sand from an established tank, what 3 corals would you put in it.

I'll go first
1)pulsing xenia
2)gsp
3)kenya tree

My easy and hardy corals are:
Bubble Coral
Green Star Polyps
Candy Cane
Duncans
Zoas

 

[ReefingDreams]

I'll go by hobby type.

Soft
1) Zoas: bread and butter varieties like Rastas, fruit loops, bam bams, etc (no protopalythoa...)
2) Discosoma muchrooms
3) Neon cabbage

LPS
1) Frogapawn (common variety)
2) Favia (spicy lemon or similar encrusting) or Leptoseris
3) Mycedium chalice (something like a space invader)

SPS
1) Milka stylo
2) Anacropora
3) Monti digi
Special mention: Miyagi or Cali tort, Champagne Coolers

Mix and match and you'll have a great start.

 

[krollins]

kenya trees and rhodactis mushrooms could live in sewers

 

[X-37B]

Purple Stylo
Any stag, slimer
Oregon Tort

 

[fish farmer]

I'm sorry I didnt mean to offend the OP, I think its a great thread, just trying to make a joke. A bad one lol

A bad joke I played on myself when I kept that single green mushroom that survived a heat wave meltdown in 2002....20 + years later still have some.

 

[AquaLogic]

I love GSP and Xenia, and they are easy. There seems to be a lot of fussing about them, but with no offense meant to anyone, all it takes is good pruning habits, just like a planted garden or tank. They are lovely corals if you manage them and have the time for your tank. To each their own, but I think calling them "plague" corals is a bit bombastic.

 

[betareef]

I love GSP and Xenia, and they are easy. There seems to be a lot of fussing about them, but with no offense meant to anyone, all it takes is good pruning habits, just like a planted garden or tank. They are lovely corals if you manage them and have the time for your tank. To each their own, but I think calling them "plague" corals is a bit bombastic.

I was just about to ask a question about this when I read your post.

Yes, I was wondering why, especially in a small nano tank, they are seen as such a problem. I was thinking you could so easily just prune and rip-out, all the undesirable growth every now and then.

 

[fish farmer]

I was just about to ask a question about this when I read your post.

Yes, I was wondering why, especially in a small nano tank, they are seen as such a problem. I was thinking you could so easily just prune and rip-out, all the undesirable growth every now and then.

As long as you don't do what I did.

Stuff a 29 gallon in a wall space will little over head to pull things out. Just enough space for strip lights and my hand. Cemented much of my rock work together. The original plan for the tank WAS for softies like mushrooms, nepthia, xenia. A couple years ago the red and green mushrooms started to fight with each other and the greens started to bud off and drop everywhere, dark corners, in between zoas. I picked one off a snail the other day.

I pulled the main mushroom rock last year and am managing them now.

 

[dakoop]

So far this reads like a list of corals not to put in my tank.

My recommendations are :
Candy cane
Blastomussa
Acans

I can't keep acans to save my life

 

[betareef]

One I didn't see mentioned is leptastrea. My LFS recommended them, and I have just added a green and an orange frag.

For the record, I have been trying to only buy fairly easy corals and also have

- sinularia
- GSP
- acan (new as well)
- duncans

 

[AquaLogic]

I was just about to ask a question about this when I read your post.

Yes, I was wondering why, especially in a small nano tank, they are seen as such a problem. I was thinking you could so easily just prune and rip-out, all the undesirable growth every now and then.

Yes, you can very easily prune them back, especially if you don't let them get out of control first. You can also put them on their own rocks isolated in the sand bed rather than on your main rock structure, and this can make them very easy to manage. They are both easy to frag and you can sell your frags to other hobbyists, or drop them off at your local LFS if you don't want to bother with selling stuff. Most LFS will be happy to sell other people your frags for their profit

I get they aren't everyone's cup of tea, and that's fine, but there is no reason to avoid them. I'm a gardener as well, and to me it's just like keeping my garden. If I don't do the upkeep of course it will get overgrown. GSP and Xenia are no different.

 

[Ghostweim]

Duncans
Leptastrea
Zoanthids

 

[Reefer Matt]

Any three of these:
Zoas, Palys, Nepthea, Toadstool, Disco/Rhodactis/Ricordia shrooms, Duncan, Blastomussa, Candy Cane, various “Favia” types, Cyphastrea, Galaxea.

(I donate my ad revenue. )

 

[Biokabe]

I was just about to ask a question about this when I read your post.

Yes, I was wondering why, especially in a small nano tank, they are seen as such a problem. I was thinking you could so easily just prune and rip-out, all the undesirable growth every now and then.

You underestimate how hardy and resilient those corals are, and how quickly they can grow once they get established. GSP, especially, cannot simply be "ripped" out. It grows from a mat, and said mat grows over your rocks and jams itself into every single nook and cranny of the rockwork to keep itself attached. It's easier to pull off a coral that's been superglued to a rock than it is to pull off the mat of a GSP colony.

In my first tank, I had both GSP and Xenia corals. At first it was manageable to prune them. But my LFS was 30 mins away, and I couldn't always justify the trip. So after some time, the corals took over the plugs I put them on. Then they overgrew the frag rack. Then they fell off the frag rack and got into the sand. Then they grew up the sand and onto the rock work. Then they completely took over the rockwork.

I should have simply pruned them and thrown the pruned pieces away, but I was new to the hobby and was enamored with the idea of fragging corals to pay for the tank and its maintenance. I couldn't bring myself to toss the excess in the garbage.

In the end, it took a complete tank crash (heater broke while I was on vacation) to get the corals under control. Even after they were completely dead, it was still a giant pain to pull the mat off the rockwork. And that's why I've never put Xenia or GSP in my tank since then.

 

[Mckreef]

No love for pipe organ? It’s pretty funny reading these it’s exactly how I started as many reefers do - GSP, Kenya tree and Xenia. Quickly realized these take over fast and ended up removing them in favor of more challenging coral. Still have some of my original pieces of GSP, pipe organ and trumpets though.

 

[Mckreef]

No love for pipe organ? It’s pretty funny reading these it’s exactly how I started as many reefers do - GSP, Kenya tree and Xenia. Quickly realized these take over fast and ended up removing them in favor of more challenging coral. Still have some of my original pieces of GSP, pipe organ and trumpets though.

Oh and mushrooms. Ugh. Keep them trimmed though and they won’t take over.

 

[betareef]

You underestimate how hardy and resilient those corals are, and how quickly they can grow once they get established. GSP, especially, cannot simply be "ripped" out. It grows from a mat, and said mat grows over your rocks and jams itself into every single nook and cranny of the rockwork to keep itself attached. It's easier to pull off a coral that's been superglued to a rock than it is to pull off the mat of a GSP colony.

You may be right. However, in a small tank, I would see removing the rock until the coral dies, or simply replacing it, as an option. Also, I would be doing a cleanup the minute it tries to leave the rock I chose for it

 

[betareef]

Leptastrea

I really like the look of this stuff. I have just attached two frags of this, one orange centred and one green centred, to a rock in my small tank. Will be interesting to see what happens when the begin to encroach upon each other.

One thing I don't like is that they have cut the frags up as little squares. The geometric shape under the coral just looks wrong. Hoping it won't take too long for it to mound up and hide the shape.

 

[saltienewb]

Easiest for me so far:
1. Duncan- persevered through my new tank swings and just keeps adding heads. Loves to eat, looks cool. Likes nutrient dense water
2. Psammacora- get it enough light and keep dkh semi stable and it will grow. Doesn’t mind some nutrients
3. Purple Gorgonian- loves light and flow, sheds skin if it collects algae. Likes nutrients

Said to be easy but tougher for me:
1. Ricordea- might have had it in too high a light for a time.But it’s actually shrunk at this point. Everything else is fine so not water quality
2. Cespetularia- totally melted in my tank. No idea why.
3. Lepto- seems like a Goldilocks coral in my tank. Put one in too high of light and it bleached. Put one in lower light and it didn’t do well either.

 

[Seansea]

I can't keep acans to save my life

Me neither. My bicolor angel makes sure of it!!