go29
Active Member
I want to be careful here and state that I don't mean to imply that low nutrients in and of themselves are "harmful" to LPS, its just been my personal experience that keeping a very low nutrient system (nitrates and phosphates undetectable) seemed to have detrimental effects on some of my lps. To combat this issue I began spot feeding EACH AND EVERY lps in my tank (don't feed any sps) and all lps seemed to have not only recovered, but thrive.
I know there is tons of debate on feeding vs not feeding corals, and I'm sure there are thousands of reefers with growing lps that never feed, but here is my PERSONAL OPINON (by no means an expert on coral) on LPS.... any coral that displays such a voracious reaction to foods and eating (thinking about my scolys and wellso brains) must have adapted those eating responses for a reason, combine that with the general knowledge in the aquarium trade that LPS do seem to enjoy slightly nutrient rich water I made the decision to start feeding mine after seeing some suffer when i began to drop my water nutrient levels.... and the results I saw in my personal tank have convinced me to continue it.
So my personal advice (what has worked for me) is keeping low nutrient levels (so as to avoid algae growth), and thus feeding the lps. I personally don't like using shrimp as even cut into smaller pieces that is a rather large meal for a coral to digest, and thus probably takes a ton of energy to do so. The feeding method I use mainly is as follows:
Take a shot glass, and put about half a scoop of reef chili (brs freeze dried coral foods) into it. Then I fill the shot glass with water, and mix up all the freeze dried foods to rehydrate them. I will then add the LPS pellet food (i exclusively use Ultra lps pellets by fauna marin). I let them soak for just a few minutes while I shut down all the flow in the tank. Then i use "julians thing" (turkey baster would accomplish same thing) and mix the glass up and suck up a bunch of the pellets along with the now nutrient rich water (full of the rehydrated reef chili). I then go around the tank and drop the pellets onto each and ever lps "head" (including all acans, hammers, frogspawn etc. So each time i squirt some pellets onto each coral it gets not only the pellets, but also a lot of the tiny particles of the freeze dried food (ensuring multiple food sources). All of my LPS display an immediate response to the pellets, and begin pulling them into their mouths.
Again this is my own personal experience in my system, but I have seen nothing but great results with my coral. Excellent color, all corals that were suffering have regrown tissue, and many are sprouting new heads and mouths at a quick rate. So take it for what its worth, but its just my opinion that any corals with a propensity for nutrient rich water and strong feeding response clearly require more than just adequate lighting levels, and thus I try and provide them with these foods every 3 days at night.
