Can you overfeed your corals ?

[Lesley]

I am just wondering if you can actually overfeed your corals.
I use seachem reef plus & trace twice a week and Reef energy A & B twice a week.
I have noticed a few of my LPS corals starting to brown a little.
They have good polyp extension and good feeding response.
I have read that overfeeding causes the coral to gain more zooxanthellae cells that are brown in color.Can someone confirm this is true (as I only saw it on one site) ???
they still look healthy but are losing a bit of the bright color.
I run a low nutrient tank and was worried corals would not get enough to eat.

[jimsflies]

I can't speak specifically to overfeeding leading to brown color...although brown colors are associated often with high nutrient systems (which may be the result of overfeeding).

I do believe that coral can be overfed. I enjoyed feeding this dendro I had and once got a little too over zealous with feeding it mysis. A short time afterwards it closed up, and over the next could weeks the center rotted out of it. I can only guess it was due to excessive mysis inside which began to decompose.

[Lesley]

Thanks for that. I am not concerned about eh high nutrient side of things. My nitrates are always below 0.02 or undetectable and phos is always less than 0.02 to undetectable hence my feeding schedule for the corals. I just have 1 frogspawn that if you look closely is starting to look a little brown and I was wondering why ? zooxanthellae cells apparently have a brown coloration to them and was wondering if anyone knew if that's maybe where the brown tone is coming from ?

[jimsflies]

What type of lighting do you have? Often corals will be exhibit darker coloration in lower light (which I always assumed was a higher concentration of zooxanthellae in its tissue).

[Lesley]

Run ATI 8 x 80watt T5s. Pretty sure it's strong enough ???

[dlhirst]

Strong enough for ??? How deep is your display tank? How many gallons?

[Lesley]

70 cm (2feet 3 inch) high - 1900cm (6 foot 3 inches) length 640cm (2ft 1inch) width 260 gallons with 80 gallon sump. ?
Light sits 21cm above the tank ?
Run 2 globes at 60% 6 globes at 70%

[jimsflies]

Its hard to say. Is your frogspawn coral on the bottom? Maybe try repositioning it, or make a frag and place it in another spot with higher light...run your own little experiment.

I've never run t5's on dimmers (I'm assuming that's what you mean by 60%). Its possible that's too low...a par meter could help here to know the difference.

[Poseidon]

Sounds like the dimmable ATI fixture, but with your tank dimensions, I would suggest running them at 100%.

[dlhirst]

640 watts total, in a 260 gallon display. I am NOT a lighting expert, but I have always heard you should shoot for at least 3-4 watts per gallon, and with your tank being 26" deep, perhaps 4+ watts. And corals with high lighting demands, you can go well above that number.

Jim is (always) right, of course. A par meter would answer a few questions for you. Maybe your LFS has one you can borrow or rent?

[Lesley]

9624Thanks. I will ramp up the % for a while and see what happens. My clam and BTAs have thrived so far ? I appreciate your answers. I am still so new at this and have so much more to learn. Thanks.

[MizTanks]

Any updates?!! :)

[dave.522]

If i feed my branching hammer, or peppermint acans too much, they will eat it all but will eventually spit it back up hours later. Since ive found that problem i feed only 2 times a week and have good growth.