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Question about plate corals


Wade

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I picked up a nive orange plate at the frag swap last week and it appears to be doning just fine. All the information I find on plates is they like high PAR. Lots of light. However, the live on the sand. Is this going to be an issue going forward? I'm running my Photon 48 at 55% right now because it's just 8" off the water. I could crank it up, but I'm afraid of frying other stuff. Will it do ok and grow with less light or am I going to have problems if I don't increase the intensity?

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From my experience, they will do well at most lighting levels if they are acclimated. I tend to think they prefer moderate light levels like most LPS and not being blasted with light like my SPS prefer. You can actively feed them if you want but they are fine without. I don't feed any of mine and they are growing all over the place. Still one of my favorite corals!

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Is this a long or short tentacle one? Assuming it's a short, they should be fine in most any condition. I would be more afraid of too much light and bleaching them than not enough. The long tentacle ones are a totally different animal though. Low flow, med to high light and make sure they never get damaged.

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Some of the plate corals are found only on lower reef slopes so high light levels is certainly not the standard to use. The family Fungiidae has 13 genus with 56 total species found in a wide range of conditions including mutually exclusive environments. Most of the plate corals aquarists get are attributed to the Fungia genus which has 18 species, most of which are found on reef slopes (not subject to wave action) and lagoons with F. moluccensis also found in turbid areas and F. scuteria also found on reef slopes subject to strong wave action. The Long Tenticle Plate, heliofungia actiniformis, is in it's own monotypic genus and is found in lagoons and shallow turbid environments.

Here's a thread that discusses reproduction in aquaria:

http://www.austinreefclub.com/topic/27478-old-fungia-skeleton/?hl=fungia#entry207252

The plates I mentioned in this thread are reproducing in only about 20-30 PAR

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Well, six days in (yesterday) and it's not looking so happy anymore. The flesh and tentacles have retreated. It still has it's orange color, but complete skeletal form showing. I've moved into a lower light region of the tank. Suggestions?

post-1837-0-03687200-1380381794_thumb.jp

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Low light low flow and see if it recovers. I have one that shed half its skin then regained it. Then after my move it got flipped over and under my egg crate for 2 weeks. I forgot all about it and when I dug it out it was all white skeleton but "stained" green. I put it in low flow low light and used a turkey baster lightly on it daily. Its recovering great

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