Buying corals

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TMartinez

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Sep 27, 2010
761
1
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Mandarin, Fl
How do most of you guys buy coral? What I mean is do you buy it large or in small frags? Do you buy locally or online?

The reason I ask is, it seems like it would take forever to fill a tank with frags and look a little disorganized. I seem to like the look of a few larger corals versus a bunch of small mix'n match ones...

Trying to get a game plan, ya know
 
Well since i work at a LFS i buy from there, i've always just bought small frags. The tank always looks a little bare at first but it fills in pretty quick, esp if you buy like most people with the reef bug! Besides its no fun to set up a tank, buy large colonies and fill the tank in a couple months, atleast IMO.
 
I buy frags from my lfs. Small frags go for $12. Assorted mushrooms any size is for $25. ;) Corals at my favorite lfs range from $12-$85. $85 dollars being the most expensive. They get new corals in every week.
 
i tend to buy both depending on the coral and the price like zoas i buy as frags cuz they grow fast but most lps i buy larger
 
well i have a few. A kenya tree, a zooanthid, a polyanthid, and frogspawn. I had a mushroom but my goby buried it and killed it lol...

I was thinking of buying a larger sized lps's like Candy cane coral or favite brain corals... something in the 5 inch range
 
TMartinez;5071738; said:
well i have a few. A kenya tree, a zooanthid, a polyanthid, and frogspawn. I had a mushroom but my goby buried it and killed it lol...

I was thinking of buying a larger sized lps's like Candy cane coral or favite brain corals... something in the 5 inch range
Click to expand...

All of the things you name grow pretty quickly. Candy canes grow quite fast as well. I bought a candy cane frag with 2 heads about 4 months ago and now I have about 10 heads(in a tank with no dosing and just a hob skimmer and powerheads for filtration.)

I think a little bit of an assortment would be ok, but go mostly frags.

A. They cost less money
B. You can get a number of different stuff(way more than if you start with big colonies)
C. Watching your system grow is very fulfilling.
D. When your corals go, you will have to trim them right away if you do a lot of big colonies. Then continue to trim them constantly when the grow.
E. Fill it up with big colonies right away and you will be bored quickly because you won't have anything cool to look forward to, or space to put anything if you happen to find something else you really really want.
 
I generally buy coral from local reefers. The local reef club has way better deals than the LFSs around me. There are a few people selling frags all the time and some people randomly selling larger pieces so I can look at a good variety. Other than that, there is only 1 LFS by me that has decent prices and good workers that actually know whats up and can answer any questions I have.
 
ok cool...

Now for the few that I have do I need to do anything? Dosing and what not? I'v ehad the frogspawn and zooanthid for about 2 months now and they look about the same. Any tips on how to get them to grow?
 
Just good h2o quality, and good lights.

I dont think with only those two corals that you need to dose...I dont dose at all...I will need to, but not until my tank has a lot of large growing corals.
 
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