Two dead Corals???

[johnnyguitars]

I have a 110 gal setup with about 130lbs of live rock and many softies. All the levels are perfect. I bought a large long tenticled plate coral and a carnation tree coral. They looked great for two weeks and both just closed up and died. I have 4 x65 watt power compacts on the tank and bulbs are new. Any insight into what happened?

[iCam]

I don't know about the plate coral, but "carnation" corals have a very bad survival record.

[Avi]

I've never had Carnations but I did consider getting one and so looked into their needs and the problem with keeping them is that they have very extensive requirement for being fed correctly. They're filter feeders that need food comprised of very small organisms. While, that may well be met by using oyster eggs that are widely available nowadays and other foods like phytoplankton, you do have to be thorough in meeting those feeding needs to keep the Carnation coral in good health.

As far as the Plate coral is concerned, the problem with them is that they have very sharp vertical skeletal structures and don't heal well or at all if they are in any way damaged on due to pressure on their own skeletons during shipping or handling from the fish store to your own reef. Sometimes that injury is on the "inside" of the tissue where it meets the sharp internal skeletal plate and so it isn't observable. Still, the injury may be there and the coral can not recover. This is a problem with many Plate corals and while they look good when you buy them, the bruise causes the decline in the coral afterwards. I hope that isn't the case with your and it's just a passing phase due to some water issue.

[johnnyguitars]

thanks for your help.