- Is it worth the effort?
I can't positively tell you yes,
but if you're obsessed with healthy,
vibrant-colored and growing corals,
then you might as well.
(upbeat music)
A big howdy howdy to all of my fellow
and future hobbyists out there.
My name is Matthew and I am your BRS beginner guru.
This is it.
No joke.
This is the final episode in this series.
(Matthew chuckling) I honestly can't believe it.
This entire series has been over 50 episodes
and started over a year ago.
I'm proud of it.
I'm proud of the work we've been able
to accomplish this past year.
I couldn't have done it without the help
of Bulk Reef Supply, but especially without all of you.
You're subscribing, you're liking,
you're watching, and you're commenting
on those videos has given me the impetus
to keep making these.
So thank you.
My goal in this series was to make this the one place
where a beginner could come to get everything they needed.
I don't know if I've accomplished it,
but I hope we've at least helped some beginners
along the way.
Somebody recently asked me,
Matthew, does this mean that your time
at Bulk Reef Supply is coming to an end?
Heck no.
I'm just gonna be moving on to a new series.
I'm not ready to tell you about it yet,
but stay tuned because I am super stoked about it
and I think you're gonna be happy as well.
Thanks for letting me reminisce for a moment.
But let's wrap up this series with episode 46,
How to Feed Corals.
We've gotta start with the question:
Matthew, do I need to feed corals?
The answer is very likely no,
but feeding will likely help the overall health of a coral,
increase vibrant colors, and increase the growth rate.
Check out this episode of the 52 weeks of reefing
where Ryan talks about a University of Hawaii study
that shows the benefits of feeding your coral.
Coral polyps can feed by using their mouths.
But a lot of corals just can absorb nutrients directly
through their fleshy tissue.
I was able to count about six different types of coral food
and it's true that some of these categories overlap
but it's important to find the right coral food
for your coral.
The first and probably most common type
of coral food is powder.
This one is called Reef Chili
and this is the product that got Bulk Reef Supplies started
in this crazy business.
Powdered coral food is probably just the all around best
for the majority of your corals.
Next up we have pellet food
and a lot of corals love something
like these golden pearls from BRS.
Depending on the coral
and depending on the size of their mouth,
many corals will actually eat small pellets.
Then we have frozen coral foods.
They're actually frozen foods
that are specifically designed for corals
or you can just use some really, really small frozen foods,
something like calanus or rotifers.
Four on the list would be some sort
of liquid dissolved nutrients.
Something like these coral aminos from Brightwell Aquatics.
Typically these are some sort of dissolved amino acids
which help build proteins
which in turn help build up tissue in the coral.
Then you have small meaty foods,
especially something like mysis shrimp.
Depending on the type of coral and the size of the coral,
they'll be able to consume those whole.
And lastly, you have live foods.
We're talking possibly something like baby brine shrimp
but more likely probably something like phytoplankton.
While something like phytoplankton might not be able
to be pulled in by the tentacles,
some corals can probably absorb it directly
through their tissue.
It's really important to remember
that different types of corals will consume different types
of coral foods.
So playing around with coral foods to see
which will give the best feeding response
from your corals is really important.
Take several different species
of LPS or large polyp stony corals as an example.
If you feed them certain small pellets or even mysis shrimp,
you can watch the feeding response.
Whereas with most small polyp stony corals,
SPS corals, or soft corals,
you would never see that kind of feeding response.
So we just have to assume it's somehow being taken
up through the fleshy tissue.
Personally speaking, I typically just feed powdered food
because I can see the feeding response
and it seems quite powerful
but I have also dabbled with different type of coral aminos
like this one from Brightwell Aquatics.
I don't personally know if it works,
but I trust the studies that have been done
that do show an increase in coloration and growth.
There aren't a whole lot of different types
of feeding tools out there
but I've collected a few and I forgot one.
One sec, be right back.
First up you have,
what do you call this like a urine cup you get
from the dollar store, specimen collection cup.
These work really well,
especially for mixing around powdered stuff.
You can put the powdered food in here,
add some water from the tank, give it a shake,
really good for broadcast feeding.
Then you have these plastic bottles.
This is the one that comes with the BRS Reef Chili.
Really good for mixing up the Reef Chili.
And then you can just put it underwater
and target feed the corals.
Then there's the classic turkey baster.
This is a stainless steel turkey baster I have used
for well over five years.
You can also get fancier plastic ones
that have a no-drip nozzle.
Then you have things that are based on syringes
like a syringe.
A huge mistake, I bought a box of 100 of these
because I go through like one every two months.
So I probably still have 90 left
but these are great for water testing,
but you can also pull up your coral food into this
and target feed your corals.
Then you have designated coral feeders.
This is one from IceCap.
I have different versions of this.
Here, let me just show you what it looks like.
These are basically turkey basters with long tubes,
finer tips, and littler bulbs.
See, look different sizes.
This turkey baster does work good,
but it's gonna drip a lot.
This is really good for those fine powdered foods.
But if you get anything like a small meaty food
or even some pellets,
this little opening's not gonna work well for that.
And lastly, there's this thing
from Two Little Fishies called Julian's Thing
and this thing is awesome.
It's a little bit expensive.
It really combines the best of a syringe,
a coral feeder, and some sort of turkey baster.
This way you can draw up the food into here
and then place this rigid piece down right in front
of your corals and target feed in very small increments,
which is amazing.
All right, enough said how to feed your corals.
Of course, as always,
I have a couple things to say before I tell you how
to feed your corals.
The first one is don't overfeed.
Feeding your corals one to two times per week is going
to be plenty because every time you are adding coral food,
especially powdered coral food,
it's extremely nutrient dense
and it can easily gunk up your water
by adding a whole a bunch of unwanted nutrients.
So you don't wanna overfeed.
And how will you know you're overfeeding?
By doing your water testing.
So when starting a coral feeding regimen
or increasing or decreasing your coral feeding regimen,
test for your phosphates and your nitrates
just to make sure your filtration can handle it.
And the second thing to consider is feed
at nighttime whenever possible.
Now that doesn't mean you necessarily have
to get up in the middle of the night,
but maybe feed early in the morning
or late in the evening
before the lights turn on or after the lights turn off.
You don't have to do this.
I often don't do this
but many corals like to feed at night.
And that's when they're feeding tentacles come out.
So by feeding them at night,
they may actually be getting more of the food.
Really, there's only two ways to feed your corals.
The first is broadcast feeding.
The second is target feeding.
Broadcast feeding is basically taking a cup like this,
pouring a little bit of the powder in there,
mixing some water, shaking it up,
unscrewing the top, and just pouring it all over your tank.
You are just broadcasting it far and wide
and allowing the corals to pick it up
while the current goes by.
To broadcast feed your corals,
I would always recommend turning off the return pump first
because you want to give the corals
as much contact time as possible with that coral food.
And if you leave the return pump on,
that means all that food is slowly gonna go
over the overflow and into your mechanical filtration
and filtered out.
So turn off the return pump first
and leave it off for about 15 minutes.
I highly, highly, highly recommend getting some sort
of wifi timer to do this.
If you have an aquarium controller, great,
but eventually, you will forget to remember
to turn that return pump back on
and that could have disastrous effects in your tank.
So what I like to do do is I hit a button on my wifi timer
and it automatically turns it off for 15 minutes
and comes back on 15 minutes later.
Some people say you should turn the wave maker off
during the broadcast feed and you totally can,
but I like to leave it on.
I turn the return pump off
but I like to leave the wave maker on
because I think it really simulates feeding
in the natural environment.
That way, when you pour in all that coral food,
the natural current inside your tank will keep circulating
that food, keeping it suspended in the water column,
hopefully for about 15 minutes,
which will be long enough for those corals
to uptake some of those nutrients.
If you wanna to know how to do this,
just get something like Reef Chili.
It's a fantastic product.
There are a whole bunch of other powdered foods out there.
Just follow the instructions on the back.
Basically you add one small spoonful
for every 20 gallons of water.
You can adjust this over time
but that's a really good place to start.
The first time you do this,
you'll be like that is very, very small amount.
And that is true.
But remember, Reef Chili is super nutrient dense
so a little can go a long way.
After you add your Reef Chili to your container,
just fill up the container with tank water.
I like to give it a little bit of a shake to mix things up.
The return pump is now off, wave maker is now on.
What I like to do is
to just pour the Reef Chili right in front of the wave maker
and let the current take it around to the corals.
Target feeding, on the other hand,
is where you mix up the exact same kind of coral food,
but instead of just dumping it in the tank
and allowing the current to take it around,
you use one of the tools we've already discussed
and you deliver the food directly to the coral polyps.
Again, I really like to use Reef Chili
but you can choose your favorite powdered coral food.
I start by turning off the return pump
and I turn off the wave maker this time
because I want as little water movement as possible.
Since I'm delivering the food directly to the polyps,
I want them to have time to grab that food
before it is taken around the tank.
Use whatever coral feeder you wanna use
to gently deliver the food to the corals.
A little can go a long way
and really try your best not to just blast the corals
with a lot of water.
But Matthew, I need to know more.
This video was super basic.
It was too basic.
Well, just watch Ryan's video right here.
He's already done the work.
So check it out.
A big thank you to all of you out there
in the YouTube world.
We're done.
We just finished a year's worth of work
and we couldn't have done it without you.
And for the final time this series,
as always, thanks for watching.
Happy reefing, be well.
We'll see you next time.