Finally a reefer!

Tim McLellan · Oct 18, 2021

I'm at nearly the 6 month mark and feeling pretty good about how things have gone with fish and inverts, so I decided to take the plunge and get my first ever coral. I got a small piece of pulsing xenia at my LFS. It has no frag plug, they just removed a small specimen off of their tank glass with a razor blade. Of course it shriveled up due the disturbance, being transported and put in a new tank, so it doesn't look like much yet. I didn't try gluing it, but rather just placed it on a rock where there is not a lot of flow. My yellow wrasse went to investigate and took a few pokes at it which didn't help. I was able to shoo the wrasse away and haven't caught it bothering the coral anymore, so hoping it was just a little initial curiosity at the new inhabitant. It's still pretty shrunken up 48 hours in, but there is some pulsing movement going on so I'm hopeful it will start to perk up and look better. Was wondering what some of everyone's experiences were with brand new soft corals like this and how long they take to recover from being put into a new system. Any thoughts or comments are appreciated.

PeterC99 · Oct 18, 2021

Congratulations on your first coral!

The most important thing now is patience. Give it a chance to get established, throw it some coral food every now and then, and make sure the flow and lighting are light to begin.

WheatToast · Oct 18, 2021

PeterC99 said:
…throw it some coral food every now and then…

I thought Xenia was incapable of feeding and pulsed to promote gas exchange, instead.

PeterC99 · Oct 18, 2021

WheatToast said:
I thought Xenia was incapable of feeding and pulsed to promote gas exchange, instead.

Know Xenia is photosynthetic but like to feed corals phytoplankton to get them established.

mdb_talon · Oct 18, 2021

Gluing them is not very effective but you can use a rubberband if needed.

If should be back to normal pretty quickly if tank is good for it. In my experience they do poorly in a tank with really low nutrients and grow like a weed in a tank with a decent amount of nutrients(nitrate/phosphate)

Karen00 · Oct 18, 2021

Post a pic.

We want to see this brave new step in your journey.

I'm still getting up the nerve to add my first ever coral but my tank is only 4 months old and I'm still working on stability.

Tim McLellan · Oct 18, 2021

Karen00 said:
Post a pic. We want to see this brave new step in your journey. I'm still getting up the nerve to add my first ever coral but my tank is only 4 months old and I'm still working on stability.

I would put a pic but it's really hard to see. It's partially obscured by rock, and as I mentioned it's pretty small and shriveled still. Once it "fluffs" up and looks better I'll add a pic. Yes it's a slow process, sometimes hard to be patient. Good for you though, you'll get there too.