Merulina ampliata

[Aquattro]

Does/has anyone kept a merulina sp. coral? I bought a large plating specimen (impulse purchase) and notice a lot of conflicting opinions on it's ease of care. Some places say real easy, Eric Borneman says not so easy....comments? Thanks!

[Acro]

Brad,

I have kept one for about 3 years. It got to big for my tank so I sold it. Unfortinately it died at it's new home. I do still have a small piece of it. I found it to like a more nutrient rich system then most of my sps's I had it high in the tank, prior to selling, but it had been in most every area of the tank with out any issues. Small tenticles will come out after feeding. It is a slower grower then most sps's. When I sold mine it barely fit in the bottom of a 5 gallon bucket. I wish I had more room. Then I would have kept it. It sometimes drop off daughter colonies. Most of what I've read state they are harder to keep but I never had any issues with it. I also know chris had a frag of it that also did well. Not sure if he still has it though.

Jamie

[Aquattro]

Thanks Jamie. Mine is about 8" in diameter and I found it a bit difficult to place in the tank. I ended up putting it right below the water surface in a mild flow area. It appears to be doing fine so far; about a billion feeding tentacles out last night. It didn't have any shipping damage to speak of and seemed healthy. Hopefully it does well. How easy was it to frag yours? Did you just snap pieces off?

[Acro]

Brad,

Yes I just busted off peices. But the problem is it takes forever to get them to grow a base. Not the best fraggers. Perhaps in a higher nutreint rich tank they might grow faster but thats just speculation. Thinking some more about them, I would say they get better color a little lower in the tank.FME

Jamie

[ 08 April 2002, 11:51: Message edited by: Jamie Cross ]

[Aquattro]

Also, I'm going to call it M. scabricula rather than ampliata.

[Acro]

Brad,

Yes, I'm sure your corals are looking better with a bit richer of a nutrient content. I have experience this as well. I think you can only do this for a short period though. I wonder if cycling a system from a higher nutrient content to a lower level on some kind of weekly or monthly schedule would have some kind of benifit. Even on a nightly scedule but you would need the equipment to totally polish the water by lights on time. If I remember correctly some German aquirist are addding soduim nitrate to there tanks to feed the animals. I could be wrong on the sodium nitrate though.I don't think there's to much info out on this as of date though.

Jamie

[Aquattro]

Jamie, do you think cycling an efficient skimmer would accomplish this? Say running two days on, two off? Or some other schedule, say shut it off one week a month?
One thing I notice with this higher load is a lower pH (down to 7.6 in AM). I'm thinking of dripping kalk to compensate until the water cleans up a bit. This could be used the week the skimmer was down. Thoughts?

[Acro]

Brad,

If thats the case I have no experience with that one. By the pics I've seen of the M. scabricula I would still say they are very simialar animals.

Jamie

[Aquattro]

Jamie, mine is primarily a plate with "nodules" growing off the top. I'll get a pic up when I can.
Since moving, I'd say I have a very high nutrient tank, however, I hope to rectify that [img]smile.gif[/img] .
I read that these are similar to hydnophora in their requirements although Eric states that definitive requirements are not known. I lowered my hydnophora in the tank and although I get much better polyp extension, it is losing a bit of it's intense green color.
Funny thing...almost all of my corals, Acro, monti, euphylia sp, etc...are showing greater extension since moving. Seems they like the higher nutrient content of the water. Hope they don't get too used to it.

[Aquattro]

Here is a link to a web pic similar to mine.

http://www.coralreefecosystems.com/i...fled_coral.jpg