Zoa frags...suggestions!?!

[roadrunner1659]

Hey guys!

I am looking into adding several different types of zoa's...i would love to have somewhat of a carpet of different types of zoa's with great color...

currently i have eagle eyes...i am talking to a guy about purchasing some frags and i was hoping i could get some comments about these types of zoa's...

...bam bam orange, zombie eyes, lunar eclipse, midnights, and golden eyes...he also has a blue zoa with brown skirts (i dont knwo the name though)

these are the zoa's i am looking at and trying to determine what will be the brightest and or the coolest to have in a zoa carpet!

thanks!

[MUCHO REEF]

THe best advice I can give you is this, just buy what you like and not what is the latest craze.

I think a question of greater concern more so than what named zoas to buy, is what type of lighting do you have. How mature is your system, is it stable, what are your parameters, what fish and inverts do you have. What type of conditions were the new arrivals grown in? Were they aquacultured from 3 or 4 polyp frags, or were they chopped off of a mother colony and shipped to you? I have seen countless tanks with an array of the most beautiful colors only to see it take a nose dive because of a few minor oversights. Not trying to shoot you down my friend, just want you to be aware of some more important issues and potential pitfalls. Focus on husbandry, water quality and over all tank params and condition with just as much vigor as collecting a rainbow of colors. Find out as much as possible about them before you receive them.

1. Were they fed regularly?

2. If so, what?

3. Type of lighting, wattage and K value?

4. If you can, ask what the conditions and all params were?

5. Skimmer or no skimmer?

6. etc

I know some will disagree, but has anyone ever received new colonies that were perfectly happy and healthy the day before you purchase, even the same day. Only to have them crash as soon as you place them in your tank or in a matter of days? Zoas are hardy, yes, but they aren't all alike.

Whatever you do, make sure you equal the light intensity if possible and always run your actinics only for the first day.

Just my 2 cents.

Mucho

[roadrunner1659]

thanks for the advice!

[roadrunner1659]

I have 2x65 watt pc lighting 1 bulb is a 10k bulb and the other is a 03 actinic bulb...

My tank is going on 3 yrs old now...

I have 2 clowns, 1 sixline wrasse, scarlet hermits, nassarius snails, and magarita snails...everything that is in my tank currently looks great!

My parameters are all great as well...i have 0 am/trites/trates/po4...my ca is 430ppm...my alk is 9-10 dkh...and my mg is 1470...

How does this all look?

[roadrunner1659]

This is what the one guy told me...

1. Were they fed regularly?
not target fed, i feed the tank mysis, seaweed of various sorts cyclopeeze, oyster eggs, some random other meaty food such as blood worms or brine, frozen rotifers, golden pearls rarely,


3. Type of lighting, wattage and K value?
the golden rings were under a 400w 20k xm, and vho actinic, the others under 250w 14k aquaconnects, one t5 aquablue, but on the frag tank i have one 6500k t5 and one vho actinic.

4. If you can, ask what the conditions and all params were?
I only test for alk and calcium. they stay around 3 and 400, respectively,
5. Skimmer or no skimmer? skimmer. i would rather overfeed to make up for what the skimmer takes out.

And the other guy told me this...

They are periodically fed freeze dried copepods. They are under T-5 lighting. I run a skimmer and do a 40 gallon water change weekly on the system the zoo frags are in. Its a 200 gallon system, approximately.


why does lighting make a difference? i mean will it be a problem going from really strong lighting such as mh to pc's...do they lose there color?

Thanks for the help and how does all of this sound?