What happened to your starting corals?

[Reef and Dive]

My first coral: exterminated. Simple as that.

 

[fish farmer]

I had a heat wave nuked my tank in 2002. I thought everything died. Some brown palys were bleached....still have some of those. From the ashes I noticed a single green striped mushroom...I let them do their thing until last year where I've started to remove them. I originally bought them in July of 2000, so over 20 years in my possession.

 

[mryan04290]

First corals were all softies GSP and zoas and my tank hit 90 degrees while in vacation everything survived except my GSP surprisingly

 

[Slocke]

First corals were all softies GSP and zoas and my tank hit 90 degrees while in vacation everything survived except my GSP surprisingly

GSP would survive nuclear war.

 

[rknapp]

Devils hand leather and a cabbage coral and their offspring have been with me and my tanks since 1995. All the other softies I started with met their demise somewhere along the way but these guys appear indestructible.

 

[radiata]

Fifty-odd years ago I purchased a rather non-descript Sarcophyton, 2.5 to 3 inches tall, from the Aquarium Stock Company in Lower Manhattan. AquaStock was a very large store for its time, and ran for a NYC full city block between Duane and Reade Streets. The Sarco did very well as it accidentally received a few hours of direct sunlight every morning.

A few weeks later I came upon an Egg Shell Cowrie at the same store. It was absolutely beautiful, and I had to have one! See Google's images of them here in the first three rows of photos on the following page:

https://www.google.com/search?q=egg+chell+cowrie&sca_esv=559545509&tbm=isch&sxsrf=AB5stBgExvwmitxx-no2qY7VxqbmHBaP4A%3A1692841125300&source=hp&biw=1510&bih=791&ei=pbTmZP-kD6ef5NoPn-ORwAo&iflsig=AD69kcEAAAAAZObCtS4Sh_6FLCiuELHhNug-caPSwrrX&ved=0ahUKEwi_i7rPlPSAAxWnD1kFHZ9xBKgQ4dUDCAc&uact=5&oq=egg+chell+cowrie&gs_lp=EgNpbWciEGVnZyBjaGVsbCBjb3dyaWVI8xNQAFgAcAB4AJABAJgBgwGgAYMBqgEDMC4xuAEDyAEA-AEC-AEBigILZ3dzLXdpei1pbWc&sclient=img.

Within a day, the cowrie was atop the Sarco. And, I said to myself "Wow, isn't that interesting..."

Two days after that the Sarco was just a neat pile of its spicules*. And, two weeks later the Cowrie had apparently starved to death.

Caveat Emptor!

* Spicule: A small needlelike structure or part, such as one of the silicate or calcium carbonate processes supporting the soft tissue of certain invertebrates, especially sponges.

 

[formallydehyde]

Haven't been doing this long but my first first coral is a palythoa that was adhered to a small live rock I bought and thought it was kinda pretty because it had a nice green center. Then I had a bad experience with adding some "live" sand (more like dead & decomposing sand) which caused a massive bacterial bloom and a huge hair algae outbreak which upset its polyps into closing for like a month. I really thought it was going to die for a while because it wouldn't open and lost almost all its color. But now it's happy and turns out it the green polyp centers are actually a bright fluorescent yellow under blue light, which is a fun bonus. It's added a couple extra polyps in the past several months but nothing crazy. SPS seem to grow faster in my tank than soft corals for some reason.

 

[shadow_k]

I'm guessing most of us started with easy fast growing corals to get going before eventually moving on to the more difficult stuff. The "beginner corals" are great for getting started. Usually tough and fast growing meaning you can get sopme success and know you're on the right track before starting on the more difficult stuff. However being fast growing and tough beginner corals can become a weed.

So my question is what was the fate of your first corals? Sold? Left on an island? Exterminated?


Personally I started with a rock of GSP and a beginners pack that contained Bob Marley zoas, Pandora zoas, yellow parazoanthids, pulsing xenia, and another frag of GSP. And their fates are as follows:

• Bob Marley: killed in accidental friendly fire intended for aiptasia.
• Pandora: Mined to destruction by greedy humans!! After becoming a uncontrollable weed it was collected and given to my butterfly and angels in my FOWLR.
• Yellow parazoanthids: After growing over a giant rock in the middle of my tank I decided they were ugly and sold the rock to an LFS for $10.
• Pulsing xenia: Learned the hard way that red fuzzy hermits are not reef safe.
• GSP frag: sold immediately for another $10.
• As for the main rock of GSP may I present GSP monster:

This is one of my first corals still alive

 

[Mark Goode]

My first coral, bought 1 year ago, was a neon green pineapple tree. I now have a neon green pineapple forest.

 

[hexcolor reef]

I've heard that happen to a few people. I know one was caused by asterinas taking a liking to it. For me it seems to survive everything. It was in my tank with my original rocks and I mixed the saltwater directly in the tank not knowing any better. So its survived 0 to probably 45ppm salt and it was February so the water was very cold.

Funny thing low temperature with higher salinity balances out with o2 availability in the water
Meaning bacteria was still able to thrive and aid your coral

Bristle worms got to my coral and a recent dosing pump malfunction rid the rest of my nano tank

 

[Narideth]

Oh gosh my first corals... some bambam zoas, random green zoas that I think are rastas, a head of duncan, a really bright purple and green hammer, some GSP and two acans.

The zoas took off and did pretty well, still in the tank. The GSP... I just peeled off the tiny remaining fragment like 3 days ago as they never really got any good foothold in the tank. I'm going to let them fill the plug if they will, then sell it.

The duncan multiplied like a weed, it's a beautiful bunch of tendrils and heads.

One acan was sacrificed to the 'let's kill all aptasia' superglue brigade (accidentally), and the other is doing nicely, several new heads.

The hammer, that poor hammer... partial polyp bailout after it dwindled and dwindled for like twelve months.... until I set up my second tank which hammers love, so it's in a new home. The Tiny Hammer of the gorgeous colors, who rebuilt a skeleton inside the old skeleton at half the size, clinging to dear life. I have hopes that the Little Hammer That Could will grow in my designated hammer tank and flourish.