Clown and Soft Corals

[rldcpa]

I was thinking I did not want to keep anemones with clownfish and was wondering how successful it would be to have clowns using softcorals instead of anemones. If so, which ones are best.

[rfalvey89]

... An intrinsic question , I would say load up the aquarium/area that the clowns are to be housed with the following:
Tree Coral
Colt Coral
Toadstool Coral
Mushrooms
Hammer Coral
Finger Leather

.. those might overlap, but that is my .02

[hollister]

I have a pair of tomato clowns that host all my coral...

[Navyblue]

IMO, coral wise, toadstool leather is best.

I prefer them LPS as they won't retract into their skeleton at night, the clownfish might scratch their body against the skeleton, and they also don't have powerful sting. For larger mushrooms, they'll also shrink at night and the clownfish might scratch their body against the rock.

If you get a nice specimen like green or yellow they can look pretty striking.

[DezertRat]

My clowns never liked anything except an old thick poly leather...
They don't like the hammer, they don't like the thin poly leather, and they even don't like the flowerpot! geeez, picky picky! I used to have some clowns that liked frogspawn though.
you just can never be too sure these days ya know!

[horwitzs]

I've had luck with a flowerpot.

[Barbelist]

I've got a maroon that lives in/with Xenia....she has the option of a large H. Crispa but prefers the softy

[Raceimage]

Elegance is the only substitute my clowns will use. No Nems in my tank so 3 clowns hang out in one back corner and 1 hangs out in the opposite back corner. Any time I place coral near them they move it out. I had 2 elegance corals and the loner clown would leave his corner to live in it but neither coral didn't like it and both eventually died.

[rldcpa]

What about Bicolor Frogspawn Coral and Atomic Torch Coral? They actually look like anemones.

[Navyblue]

What are you really asking? What corals has the highest probability of being hosted by clown fish?

A clown fish host whatever it wants. That can be a rock or a power head or tank corner. Looking like anemone doesn't really mean too much. Plenty ignores even real anemones. You don't get much more anemone looking than a real anemone.

Just get any fleshy coral mentioned here that you like best and hope for the best.

[rldcpa]

Yes that is exactly what I was asking. I don't really want anemones as they move...coral doesn't. And I wanted member's experiences that had successful results.

Thank you.

[AquaReeferMan]

Frogspawn, hairy mushroom clusters, Finger and Toadstool leathers have all worked and are currently working as hosts for various clowns I have. I don't do anemones too much anymore.

[c2g174]

ive had clowns host torch coral and toadstools kinda cool to see somthing different

[Mussin]

I have a 10G and my tiny maroon clown hosts my green polyp toadstool. He sleeps in it, ill try to get a pic.

[kretzkiller]

Candy cane

[horwitzs]

I've had luck with a flowerpot.

Almost forgot, the same clowns would also snuggle with a galaxea that was near the flowerpot.

[velvetelvis]

IMO, coral wise, toadstool leather is best.

I prefer them LPS as they won't retract into their skeleton at night, the clownfish might scratch their body against the skeleton, and they also don't have powerful sting. For larger mushrooms, they'll also shrink at night and the clownfish might scratch their body against the rock.

If you get a nice specimen like green or yellow they can look pretty striking.

+1 I've had great luck using toadstools as a stand-in for anemones. Tougher than old shoe leather, and they often look remarkably like anemones when they get big.

[Tmoriarty]

Corals/anemone host, clowns associate :)
I hear large hairy mushrooms work well.