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New LT Plate Coral

itsacrispy

itsacrispy

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Hey all,

I picked up a 10" LT plate coral on Saturday, my first coral in a long, long time :).

I did a bit of reading on the coral handbook, but I still have a few observations and questions about this coral:

- I read that plates like med-high flow, but even with indirect flow from my Koralia 4, half the tentacles were retracted. After turning the K4 off and just using the K1 and sump return pump (600GPH), the tentacles opened up to what appears to be its max. My question is, will the plate like the stronger flow in the long run? Does it just need to acclimate to it? Part of why I ask this is because there's probably not enough flow for the rest of the tank. I can already see some spots of detritus on the sand.

- What does it mean when the plate regurgitates food? The second day I had the plate I fed it some krill. It gobbled up the food early on, but after a couple hours, I saw that it had regurgitated the food. Does this mean the plate doesn't like Krill or that it's full? I have no idea how corals work in terms of "taste", but I figure that if it's hungry, it'll bring the food to its mouth. So I'm leaning towards the assumption that maybe it didn't like the krill.

- The last question is tied in with the one above. I read that plates tend to eat meatier foods, which was why I fed it krill. But what kinds of food have you guys successfully fed your plates?

Thanks a bunch all!

Mike
 
Congratulations on your new plate coral :) 10" is huge!

-Back when I had my LT plate coral, I noticed mine liked areas of "medium" flow. Now, whether a coral like low, medium, or high flow is always very relative, but for what it is worth, my plate had just enough flow to gently sway the tentacles. What is very cool about these Heliofungia's is that they are mobile. They are able to inflate and deflate different areas of tissue continuously to simulate a sort of crawling motion. So, even if the plate coral is not happy somewhere, it has the ability to seek more ideal areas for placement. The tentacles being held in may be an indication that it is receiving too much flow IMO - mainly because even in low flow the one I purchased had its tentacles expanded.

-Most times when a coral regurgitates food, it is usually an indication of a net loss in energy from the meal. Energy is spent drawing in the food, and digesting the food. I suppose a coral can't get around those. But regurgitation also requires decent amounts of energy occur. It'd be fine if the coral consumed the entire meal and kept it down though. Gresham can probably elaborate more on this, and correct where I am wrong :)

-The first time I tried to feed my Heliofungia krill, it reacted the same way yours did. After that I fed mysis, and the plate loved it. So I say give mysis a try - it is smaller than krill, and a softer than krill. Plus, it has all those nice fatty oils :)
 
mmmm, I think many corals are rely mostly on photosynthetic processes to fulfill their metabolic needs -so I don't know if lowering the lights would help or not. I think, in our aquaria feeding supplements the lighting we provide, not vice versa. There are days (or periods of time) on the reef where there is minimal light punching through the water during storms and such, but I believe even then there is some light (reduced amounts I'm sure) that gets to the corals. Though honestly, I wouldn't recommend intentionally providing corals with much less than adequate lighting chronically -I just can't see that being beneficial. my .02.
 
Gotcha. I'm not going to intentionally dim the lights, I just have a pretty low-light tank. Although, the LFS I got the plate at had it in a very, very low-light area for several months, and it was plump as ever!
 
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