feeding corals

[obie]

I'm interested in what people generally feed their corals. I see a lot of emphasis regarding water quality, but not a lot of discussion about proper feeding - yet In Ron Shimek's "Coral Reef Aquarium", he repeats "feed them a lot" many times (in reference to coral). I know that if you get your detrivore going strong, then that supplies a lot of it - plnakton, etc. How many of you take measures above that? Do you buy the expensive coral food you find in pet stores? And here's another question that perplexes me - its always directed that you should only feed your fish as much as they will eat in 5 minutes. But that doesn't leave anything for the cleanup crew that depend on the leftovers (stars, crabs, shrimp, etc). How do I know my cleanup critters are properly nourished? It just seems that feeding is a critical key to health and I haven't found very good info.

 

[danmhippo]

That's quite a few questions, maybe next time you want to break them into several individual questions.

Just to answer your first. I tend to steer away from shelf packaged invert food. 1. I do not know how long ago was it made. 2. Their price are usually hyped. I usually go to the source, such as brineshrimp direct for their phytoplankton concentrate. In addition, I feed them decapsulated artemia egg plus golden pearl to simulate rotifer feed.

One more thing about feeding corals. It depend on what kind of coral you have. I am feeding the above mentioned because I have mostly gorgonians and polyps. Some soft corals and SPS does not capture food. You have to research into the requirement of your keeps.

HTH