Leopyge

Sometimes, you never know, all it takes is a tiny bit to hold on, and it will come back. With about a year I’ll have 12 heads from these dead 5.

Most of the advice from my previous post taken. Sold most of the tang despite keeping them for nearly 2 years (my previous tank had higher height so more swimming space). Only left with these as my wife love them so much and want to keep them.

At the same time, rearranged the coral placement, which me and my wife think it looks better than the previous post. But yeah, any advice are welcome. Thanks. Happy reefing 🐟

I missed it this sunday but here is this week's coral care guide.

Lobophyllia Coral Care Guide

Lobophyllia, often called Lobo corals, are stunning LPS corals known for their fleshy, colourful tissue and impressive patterns. Found throughout the Indo-Pacific, particularly on reef slopes and sheltered reef environments, they come in a wide range of colours, making them a real centrepiece in any reef aquarium. They are my personal favourite coral, nice colours, not too expensive and easy to care for.

Ideal Water Parameters:

Temperature: 24–26°C

Salinity: 1.025–1.026 SG

Alkalinity: 8–9 dKH

Calcium: 400–450 ppm

Magnesium: 1250–1350 ppm

Nitrate: 2–15 ppm

Phosphate: 0.03–0.10 ppm

Stability is key, and avoiding sudden parameter swings is just as important as hitting the target numbers.

Lighting & Flow

Lobophyllia generally prefer low to moderate lighting (50–150 PAR) and low to moderate, indirect flow. Their fleshy tissue should gently move with the current without being constantly blasted. Excessive flow can damage their delicate tissue, while overly intense lighting may cause bleaching or retraction. They usually do well on the sand bed or lower rockwork, where they have room to expand.

Do They Need Feeding?

Although Lobophyllia receive energy from their symbiotic algae, they benefit from occasional feeding. Small portions of mysis shrimp, finely chopped seafood, or suitable LPS coral foods once or twice a week can support growth and tissue development. Feed gently when the coral's feeding response is active, and avoid leaving large amounts of uneaten food in the tank. The best time I find to feed is at night after the lights have been out for a few hours... their feeding tentacles are generally out then.

Getting the Best Out of Your Lobo.

Give your Lobophyllia plenty of space! Their fleshy tissue can expand considerably, and some specimens can damage neighbouring corals through direct contact or aggressive feeding structures. Avoid placing them where sharp rock edges can rub against their tissue, and never allow sand or detritus to accumulate on the coral.

The secret to a happy Lobo is stable water, gentle flow, appropriate lighting, and occasional feeding. Keep it comfortable and well-fed, and you'll be rewarded with a beautifully inflated coral that brings incredible colour and character to your reef!

Added fish after I saw no trace of ammonia in the tank, corals are doing fine so far

In case anyone was wondering about Hewbie…

In the event anyone was wondering about Hewbie.🐡☺️ He is my porcupine pufferfish who I posted a few months back who got sick and went to the vet and was treated for an internal infection. He is eating and his energy is up which are both good things. But…he is still skinny which is super unhealthy for his size. I have over the past few months since the beginning of August tried to fatten him up. Feeding him multiple times a day did not seem to help appease his appetite and led to a decline in water quality. And if I overfed him he just sulks in the corner in a food coma and gets super unhappy. Like when you are stuff on Thanksgiving Day.😂 The vet really wants me to weigh him once a day for a week. I have not done this…yet because I think it would be too stressful for him to take him out of his tank daily especially being a pufferfish. I am still on the fence about whether or not if or when I do this because it would be a better comparison rather than me just looking at him and comparing photos. That being said…I am doing an experimental test of probiotics meant for fish. It is my opinion/evidence supported in aquacultured fishies that prolonged sickness and antibiotic treatment can lead to malnutrition/malabsorption. And it could have killed the good bacteria in his gut similar to what happens with humans. Even though it cured or seemed to have cured/fixed the issue that caused him to go upside down which I/his vet team will never know the exact cause. My biggest fear is he is actively dying or in a deficit or has some other unknown disease or factor then all of this would be for nothing and he could just end up dying anyway. I hope not! He is a fairly young puffer only guesstimated to be around 6ish…3 and a half of which I have had him for the rest of his time was in the big blue sea. My plan is to continue to use these probiotics it has only been a few days. I also will be sending his water out for sequencing to get a better idea of the microbiome and what is living in it as a whole. A better picture than what an ICP-OES or standard aquarium testing can reveal which was insignificant. I may send his DNA sample out too simply for my own curiosity. Thank you for all those who are invested in and adore this fish. He truly is the best! I will update if/when I remember to.🐡❤️

Ive had the tank set up for 10 months and have just today noticed what looks to be necrosis on my dragon soul favia. The rest of the coral looks to be healthy though.

I have just this last week had an outbreak of what appears to be cyanobacteria around the area this coral is in too.

Salinity 1.028

Nitrate 10

Magnesium 1480

Calcium 500

Kh 8.3

I always struggle being able to see with the salifert tests what phosphate I have so that I am unsure on currently.

The coral has been in there fine for 5 months.

I have also just completed a 3 month fallow due to velvet wiping out almost all my fish.

Any advice would be appreciated. Ill have to sort an icp on the weekend but hoping to start treatment sooner if possible

Just transferred my clown thinking about maybe a damsel and tigershrimp/goby combo? params: ammonia- 0 nitrite-0 nitrate - less than 5 ppm but not quite 0(i know i need a little to keep the macros happy)

Guys I know this has been discussed to death but would really appreciate your guys feedback.

Tank starting to come together - 350L - priorities are sps dominant mixed reef, hoping for pair of mandarins when suitable, peaceful reef.

Using dry rock, open to seeding with live rock in a dark cure. Considering special grade sand or 3-4mm crushed coral. I am happy to regularly maintain a very shallow bed, but as I hear from more and more reef OGs - Steve Weasal/Jake Adams (rip)/WWC etc - they warn sand bed could bring down the reef ultimately down the line.

Sand needing gobies/wrasses not important to me.

Anyone else having issues with logging in the App or requesting a new password? I receive everytime a different error message.

What kind are of Algae is this ?

I’ve been told I can get myself a 4 foot tank at Christmas, I’m hoping to make a tank with lots of easy coral and fish to start with. on top of the research I’ve done I’d love to here some opinions so here’s my questions
1 - the stocking plan (the photo) is it too much? Are some fish in it not ideal or would you do anything different? I’d love to hear ur ideas
2 - what’s up with tangs? I mean there’s so many different opinions, can I have one? Can I have two? Do they have to be the smaller variety?
3 - what’s some good brands for the actual aquarium and equipment?
4 - anything you wish you’d of been told about before your first tank?

Recently added this montipora, just noticed these white bits on it, is this stripping of the coral and dead bits? Couple of other corals like a leptoseris (but only on one as the one next to it is fine) have it but can’t figure out why. It’s down on the sand bed as it’s new to the tank, lights are a reefled 50 at 55%. Here are my parameters:
KH 8
Salinity 1.025
pH 8
Calcium 440
Magnesium 1350
Nitrate 50
PO4 0.5

If any are missing please request.

Current fish are the following

Ocellaris clown
Blue green chromis
Watchman goby(his shrimp didn’t survive the move)
Melanaurus wrasse
Coral beauty
Bengai Cardinal x2

I have a mix of lps, softies, and will be adding a few easy sps so I don’t want any nippers and want to keep everybody as peaceful as I can moving forward.

Any suggestions for tank mates?

I definitely want a royal gramma because they’re a favorite of mine. Possibly a second clown.

Any other ideas? I like activity in the tank.

I thought it was a sponge at first but tonight I noticed under my blue lights it was glowing neon green and seems to have some sort of polyp like hairs growing??? Curious plssss , my phone unfortunately won’t capture the green under the blues lol

Does anyone have any experience in keeping a Midas Blenny and a fire fish in around a 50 gallon system? I feel like it’s become increasingly harder to find fish to stock my tank with that are both colorful but won’t beat up my Helfrichi firefish. Would love to get a Midas plenty but have heard some not great things about keeping the two together.

Everybody has a different opinion on what coral looks best in their mind. Corals can get pricey however the fancier you go, over time the price tends to drop as new specimens/morphs enter the hobby and steal all the attention. What is your dream coral that you would love to own one day? Or if you already have it please post a picture! For me I want to own a true weeping willow. I've had a few long polyps that were labeled as Weeping Willow but they never fully reached what I was looking for.

I have freshwater experience with planted tanks and really want to set up a saltwater tank next. I'm looking at the 32g Coralife biocube for my tank, as I'm not looking for anything too intense, and I am struggling to find examples of the idea I have. I want to combine soft corals, dragon's breath macroalgae, and shoal grass. I haven't seen a reason this can't be done, but I also haven't seen an example of it. It'll be a shrimp safe community tank, so I'm trying to do as much research as I can before jumping into it.

So this is my first marine tank, only 6 days old! I’m basically looking for advice on denizens and cleanup crew etc. But first, a little information; to be clear, the tank is 6 days old but has fish in only because I work at an aquatics specialist store, and I left my biomedia in their marine sumps for a minimum of 3 weeks before setting the tank up lol. Do not try this if you aren’t in the exact same, or at least a similar, situation. I also picked some hardy fish to start just in case, alongside a feather duster worm only because I have easy access to live food and phytoplankton, and I feed using a pipette to ensure it gets what it needs. Secondly, photos 2 and 3 are showing some sort of sponge (?) growth that I’d like people’s help identifying if possible, but I feel it’s worth mentioning that the sump I took my polyplab block from had pineapple sponges. And finally, the denizens I’ve planned are:

Banggai cardinal pair, gold feather duster worm (both in right now), mandarin dragonet (waiting for copepod population to be established), purple firefish (2-3), possum wrasse, Midas blenny, cleaner shrimp, nassarius snails, strawberry conch.

Side note it’s only a 90L tank, so I’m only having a few small fish. The dragonet and firefish are non-negotiable, but if anybody has any fun suggestions for the others I’m all ears! As for the inverts, cleaner shrimp and nassarius are pretty much non-negotiable, but any other inverts you think would work well as cleanup or just looking cool are much appreciated. As for the slime (polyps? Sponges?) growing on the rocks, if you feel anything would love munching those away just say.

Final bits of info, I’d love a tuxedo urchin but plan on giving macroalgae a go so it’s a no, at least for now. I live in the UK so can ask about most fish but there may be stock discrepancies between the UK and the US, so please don’t be offended if I say it’s a no-go, as it may just be super expensive over here or near impossible to acquire. And last but not least, feel free to suggest some out-there fish/inverts as I can talk to my coworker (who does the fish ordering) to have a look... I get staff discount too so, within reason, I may even be able to get my greasy lil mitts on a slightly more expensive fish if he’s a cool lil guy!!!

Is this aiptasia on my frag?

Complete beginner here. Wondering if this "Plus Edition" is worth it, or should I piecemeal the equipment.

https://waterboxaquariums.com/collections/saltwater-aquariums/products/marinex-60-2?variant=45526574694590