Coral Growth

Does anyone use Coral Accel or any other additives for coral growth/stimulation.

Just wondering the consensus here on them and if they are worth getting to add to my tank.

Thanks.

 

many would agree that light alone will provide the needs of a great many corals in our reef tanks
that combined with target feeding for the species that require it


but I do use the following additives but mostly on my softy and nano tanks

cyclopeeze - my fish love it and my corals perk up when its introduced
reef plus - vitamins and aminos by SeaChem - In the Nano
Accel, chromoplex and microvert - by Kent - in the softie tank
Mark Weiss reef bugs (Its alive) (used this in Nano- Zoas like it but also in the 5ft for encouraging PE once per week only at present whilst monitoring water quality)
Tropic Marin - pro coral Zooton small amounts across all my tanks - trying it out as above

water quality is key
as is general condition of your tank - dont add to much to often
stop adding anything if nitrate start to increase and cyno etc starts appearing

Steve

 

I agree with Steve pretty much but here's my exact opinion.

I would focus on making sure your water quality and light are adequate first. Once you have those down, for a month or two at least then consider other things. For most people, if you're not using a bacteria system like ZeoVit/Prodibio etc then feeding and light is all you really need along with stable chemistry. Even feeding can be debatable but I think it's good insurance. Corals can starve out slowly over the course of months so it's difficult to tell until it's almost too late.

I would also recommend making clear what is food and what is chemistry. There are some slightly blurry lines here but generally food is usually a plant/animal to be fed, even if the solution looks like a pure liquid (like oyster eggs or phytoplankton) they still can be microcopic plants/animals. Chemistry on the other hand is things like iodine/strontium etc. Aside from the big three (alk/cal/mg) I don't like to add anything else, just do water changes. I'm not a big believer in supplementing other stuff since I haven't seen any hard proof that it helps, plus I hate testing for more stuff than I already do (cal/alk/mg/no3/po4/salinity).

It also depends hugely what type of coral you want to keep. Some will definitely need some types of feeding others can use it occasionally. All coral will eat some type of food whether that food is produced naturally by your tank in decent quantity or not is another question.

I would recommend reading the sticky thread in the coral forum here on 3reef about feeding coral. Make sure you're feeding size-appropriate food and that the types of food are appropriate for the type of coral you're keeping.

Right now what I use is Prodibio BioDigest and BiOptim weekly/biweekly as instructed (for nutrient export), I also use the ZeoVit amino acids daily. I feed Reef Chili now a couple times a week. I just picked up some Oyster Feast this weekend, I'm also trying out some rotifers (frozen and eventually live) for my SPS. I will alternate these foods every day or two. I think a lot of people's tanks don't have as much food available for corals as they get in the wild so I'm looking to supplement that.