Let’s talk about Elegance Coral

[AmaleeC]

Hello everyone! Fellow reefer here, just wanting to hear about your experience with elegance’s. Someone told me they usually die after a few weeks of having them and not to get it. But I decided to give it a shot. What are your experiences with them?

So far “giving it a shot” was going very well but now it is acting up.. It spat out some food from yesterday, and my wrasse nibbled at the food. Then it shrunk dramatically. You can see the mouth that the food came out of very clearly in pic #2.

Here’s mine 2 hours ago:

And this is what it’s doing now:

P.S. I noticed ammonia was high. I made the rookie mistake of adding fish too quickly
So I added some Seachem Prime and some more bacteria from Microbacter Start. My GSP has retracted too, but I don’t think that’s from the Microbacter or the prime.

 

[ReefLab]

Ive had an elegance for 4 or 5 months and it looks better than the day I got it. You should do a large water change as ammonia is toxic to fish and to coral. What did you find the ammonia level to be?

I find that the elegance can be temperamental but is happiest low-moderate flow. moderate light. 5-20ppm nitrate. be sure to pause pumps when you feed your tank so the coral can catch some things out of the water.

 

[OrionN]

Spitting our food from yesterday is evidence that you gave him too much food. Try to feed smaller amount. When food does not completely digested in coral, it start to grow bacterial and cause problem. The coral just need to dump it out and shrink down to dump all the bad stuff out from it's body.
Just like us when we have "bad stuff" inside our body we throw up and have diarrhea to get rid of it from our body. That is what your coral is doing. Don't feet him so much next time.

Elegance Coral do need to be on the low side of both light and current. Very beautiful coral, good luck with him.

 

[AmaleeC]

Ive had an elegance for 4 or 5 months and it looks better than the day I got it. You should do a large water change as ammonia is toxic to fish and to coral. What did you find the ammonia level to be?

I find that the elegance can be temperamental but is happiest low-moderate flow. moderate light. 5-20ppm nitrate. be sure to pause pumps when you feed your tank so the coral can catch some things out of the water.

I’m ashamed to even say how high it is... 1ppm I’ve been doing some research and didnt see anything on the affect ammonia has on corals ? I know that’s a question that has to be researched && has a lot to do with science. But I saw some anecdotal support for that to say the least. Regardless, working on it now. I should’ve waited longer between testing my fish before adding new ones, rookie mistake. Luckily my fish and corals are still looking good and handling it well. I will continue to monitor them..

I agree. I keep my elegance in a low flow, low light area, and he loves it!

@OrionN wonderful explanation! Thank you, he had me a little nervous. I’ll keep a close eye on him as he’s definitely my new favorite. Btw I saw a older thread on your china wrasse and I’m so jealous! Very nice additions.

 

[Sosuke]

Mine is an 8 inch beast from Indonesia I keep it under an AI Prime 16, corals can be very sensitive to high ammonia levels which is probably what's happening here. I think sometimes my flasher wrasse hides in its tentacles and pecks at its base

 

[AmaleeC]

Mine is an 8 inch beast from Indonesia I keep it under an AI Prime 16, corals can be very sensitive to high ammonia levels which is probably what's happening here. I think sometimes my flasher wrasse hides in its tentacles and pecks at its base

Wow! Share some pics of your elegance if you can
I’ll be watching it to see what happens and if it’s really bothered by the ammonia. GSP is slowly opening back up and it wasn’t too disturbed before.

My female richmond’s wrasse keeps a close eye on all of the corals and devours all pests. I’ve even caught it eating GHA growing on some zoas. Definitely my favorite fish. I plan on getting another wrasse in the future. But I definitely will not be adding any fish for the time being.

 

[OrionN]

I have mine under the shade of other corals. My tank flow and light are on the high to very high side

 

[Sosuke]

Heres some pics sorry part of its closed because I was cleaning the glass. I have the stock lights on currently (its a biocube) and put on the prime later in the day

 

[Appaloosa1224]

Australian elegance are also much hardier than Indos. I haven't ever had much of a problem keeping them in the past and they are just lovely! I just picked one up this afternoon. It's been a while since I've had one! I agree it looks like he may be pooping. Don't be too worried unless he stays like this for a while.

 

[homer1475]

I have 2, both aussie. One pinked tipped, and one purple tipped. The pink I've had for a couple years now and is a beast.

I have mine in the sandbed(where they are collected if having a conical shaped base), low flight, low light. Both do very well.

 

[Brian_68]

I had one last a few years, about a foot across when open. Tank at the time was higher nutrients, lower light.

 

[homer1475]

 

[Lithoman]

My elegance has been thru tons of my mistakes and looks great.. During the day its the size of a football.. But as soon as the light go out it shrinks to the size of a baseball.. I feed it every other day a big chunk of a shelled shrimp.. She gobbles it up... And when I say my mistakes I mean my mess ups.. almost ripped her up when I was doing a water change.. hose grabbed her good.. She was not happy for a half a day..

 

[Lithoman]

just went and took a pic.. It does host two clowns..

 

[NHgoalstop]

I've always loved these corals but always feared they'll eat my fish. Are these guys much of a threat? I only have 2 clowns a damsel and a six line.

 

[homer1475]

Snails, and possibly crabs and shrimp dumb enough to get close, sure.

Fish have never been an issue.

FYI, they love snails, its a literally snail graveyard by my big one.

 

[Lithoman]

I did catch mine chomping on my starfish...but she loves the clowns

 

[Alemoki]

I had my elegance coral for about a year and a half (from almost the start of my setup) and it was one of the easiest corals I've ever kept.

I had it from the start in a barebottom tank for about 9 months (it alternated between being on the rock work and on the glass bottom) then it went onto my sandbed when I put sand in my tank and it was just as happy (possibly a bit happier).

I fed it a lot the first few months but got lazy and missed a few feedings here and there and eventually realised that it didn't seem to bother whether it got fed or not so ultimately it got a small snack here and there and probably ate a lot of my snails that got close.

I had it in quite high flow and it always extended big!

Here are some pics for you guys. I miss this guy but he got too big for my system unfortunately

For reference...this is a 24 inch tank

My arm is barely visible in the background here

In its box when it got sold

Biggest advice is to keep things stable (as with any coral) and be sure to get a nice healthy specimen from day one. Preferably only buy one which has been proven to be doing well for sometime. I do believe that mine was an Aussie elegance FWIW

 

[Alemoki]

I found a video of mine

Excuse the horrific noise of the fridge in the background please

 

[NHgoalstop]

I had my elegance coral for about a year and a half (from almost the start of my setup) and it was one of the easiest corals I've ever kept.

I had it from the start in a barebottom tank for about 9 months (it alternated between being on the rock work and on the glass bottom) then it went onto my sandbed when I put sand in my tank and it was just as happy (possibly a bit happier).

I fed it a lot the first few months but got lazy and missed a few feedings here and there and eventually realised that it didn't seem to bother whether it got fed or not so ultimately it got a small snack here and there and probably ate a lot of my snails that got close.

I had it in quite high flow and it always extended big!

Here are some pics for you guys. I miss this guy but he got too big for my system unfortunately

For reference...this is a 24 inch tank

My arm is barely visible in the background here

In its box when it got sold

Biggest advice is to keep things stable (as with any coral) and be sure to get a nice healthy specimen from day one. Preferably only buy one which has been proven to be doing well for sometime. I do believe that mine was an Aussie elegance FWIW

An absolute unit.