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coral growth


chimera

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im going to try and create an animated gif file that shows coral growth of a particular coral i have (id below please?) first shot was taken 5th march, second shot was taken tonight - only 10 days later. you can make out the growth in just 10 days in this pic! i will add more frames to this every 10 days. it is not the easiest thing to do (unless i leave the camera in the same position) The image currently alternates between the 5th and 15th of March. You can see visible growth at the tips. Will update on the 25th!

coralgrowth.gif

fingers crossed the coral/rock its sitting on doesnt get knocked off it's perch...!

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Well that's pretty awesome chimera, didn't know that could be done on this site.

The coral is a hydnophora, they are an sps but a little different from most other sps. They are as hardy as any softy and do not need the pristine conditions or high light that other sps do. Growth tends to be slowish but steady, regardless of conditions.

My own one I grew from the tiniest frag you could imagine, would have been no bigger than a match head. It was a frag at jansens that slowly died, they sold it to me as a piece of rock, but it had this one little floro green blob on it, must have been down to the last polyp. Anyhow it's now several inches high and wide, and as I keep breaking it I've got a heap of frags of it around the tank.

Apparently you have to watch this coral it is meant to be an aggresive stinger of it's neighbours, although I've never had a problem with mine.

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Good idea Chimera.

It is indeed a Hynophora. My experance with Hynophora is that they are very fast growing, I got a piece from Alois about 1.5 years ago, was about the size of a finger nail clipping. I have sold several branch sized bits similar to the one in you photo, I have a piece in my tank about the size of a small childs head, another piece about thse size of 4 fists, and another about the size of a single fist, + many frags.

Its a VERY aggressive coral, but does not send out sweepers or stingers. It does however bloat and spew out its guts and kill other corals (SPS only in my experance). It is a coral that has killed more other coral in my tank than everything else combined. Usually this is in the form of a coral tipping over and touching it, or it tipping over and landing on someting else.

In you picture it looks skimilar too mine. In others tanks it can look far more spindley and much greener without the visible white/lime polpys. Its body is 'bloated' in the pciture, on ocasion it will 'shrink'.

I like this coral, needs to be treated with respect. Very fast growing, seems to do well in my tank regardless of light or current.

Pies

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Brian that fuzzy / hairy appearance is an indicator of prime health, one happy hydnophora :D

They can send out sweepers, although they are not true sweepers, they are feeding tentacles, although I cannot remember the scientific name for them. They have been known to extend up to 4 inches, although 2 inches is a more common limit. They actually sting the victim, latch on, and then extract nutrients from it, killing that portion of the victim. There are some pics of this on RC, if anybody is clever enough to find them.

Mine will feed off a small portion of mussell, if I drop it in the crux of the coral, it will entwine all over it with sweepers, and slowly absorb it.

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They are not too fussy by sps standards about light or current IRA, so that leaves the likely candidate to be water. You'd need to check your salinity really is what your hydrometer is telling you it is, your temperature is what it's meant to be, and then the usual parameters, ca, etc. and if still nothing obvious, then, if you feel it worth it, a huge water change or two.

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