it's time to add corals to the 220 gallon build so i need to plan the overall layout and coral
placement i plan to keep because planning a coral layout and having a vision for your tank is quite
important you know when you see an incredible reef tank that just blows your mind you know those
tanks where all of the corals just seemed like they were meant to be placed next to each other
the reason why these tanks are so visually appealing is because they were thought out
beforehand sexy tanks look sexy because the person behind it had a vision of how it would eventually
look and planned out how to make that vision come to life you know i've covered aquascaping planning
techniques in some of my previous videos but it's time i talk about how to plan a coral layout
because even though aquascapes are important we all know that it's always been about the corals
anyway so in today's video i am going to use my new 220 gallon build as an example of how you
can approach planning a coral layout and creating a vision for your tank your coral layout plan can
be as detailed or as flexible as you want it to be but just try to envision what your end goal with
your tank build is to start the planning process figure out what kinds of corals you want to keep
do you want to keep softies lps sps or mix also think about whether there are specific corals you
really want to see in your tank do you want to keep a zoa garden have a chalice here or there
or maybe even an anemone note those must-have corals that are really important for you to keep
impulse buys are one of the best parts of this hobby so remember that this list doesn't have to
be stringent and something you stick to with no exceptions but if you absolutely have to
have a hammer garden in your tank make sure to keep that in mind during the planning process
for my 220 gallon tank i really want to have a mixed reef and incorporate softies lps and sps
i know i definitely want to add a lot of acros i've developed a serious case of acro fever for
the past two years so adding a lot of sps is really important to me i also do really love my
lps as well i definitely want to include a torch have a goni garden and maybe a hammer garden after
figuring out the general types of corals you want to keep it's a good idea to think about areas of
your tank that could potentially hold different types of coral each coral has its own individual
needs and requirements for flow lighting and who it can tolerate as its neighbor so it's essential
that we take all of this into account each coral you will add to your tank will only have so many
positions in your tank that will thrive in even if you're not set on any specific type of coral
think about what your options are for certain areas consider how light and flow affect the
choices you can make i mean the last thing that you want to do is impulse purchase a coral down
the road and then realize that you don't actually have any real estate left in places it will thrive
in another consideration when planning out your coral layout is to think about the colors of your
corals in their growth patterns have a range of colors throughout the tank and avoid adding too
many corals with the same color because it can easily make your tank look bland when thinking
about your coral layout it's also a good idea to use color theory to your advantage place
corals that are complementary in color next to each other it creates contrast between your corals
and makes them really stand out i have a video that goes into depth about how color theory
applies to coral placement if you want to check out how to apply this method it's an easy way to
make the colors of your coral look artificially brighter and emphasize specific corals or
areas of your tank another important thing to consider when designing your coral layout is
to consider the growth patterns and the movement of your coral have a good balance of corals that
have little movement and corals that have a lot of movement for example place a cans with little
movement near hammer garden with a lot of movement contrasts a frog spawn with a nice leather coral
adding variety and contrast to your tank using the colors and the growth patterns of the corals you
select is really important to take into account as you add new additions because it makes your
tank look really visually appealing and sexy to the eye and it also mimics the natural reef
so it's time to incorporate these principles and plan the coral layout process for my 220 gallon i
think the best way to plan this is to play the classic game of pin the coral to the aquascape
shout out to reevetide for letting me use their corals and pin the coral to my aquascape what
we're going to do is for each round i'm going to use these corals to plan the general layout of
my tank using the ideas i talked about earlier in this round i'm going to plan a general layout of
my acros the higher parts of my aquascape have high light and high flow so i have to place the
acros in these general areas and we have a lot of variety of color to work with here we've got
red blues greens we have all of it in terms of placing them i'm going to use the color theory
to figure out where they specifically should go so i'm going to start with this first red acro here
and pop it here and then if we look at the color wheel the complementary color of red
is green and this is a nice little green acre here you know pop that next to the red one and
then looking at green on the color wheel the closest complementary color to green that isn't
red is pink so this little acro would look really nice here and then balance the pink out with this
little guy and vary it up with the next closest complimentary color which is purple and this
acro is perfect yep that looks nice looking at the color wheel need a nice yellow color
this fella right here is perfect you know pop them right here because this area here is a little bit
separated it's kind of like a wild card of sorts so i'm going to pop this red acro over here
looking good looking good now moving on to the right structure we have a blue acro orange aggro
and green orange mix left the orange and the green orange mix both are complementary to the blue
acros so the blue acro should definitely be in the middle we'll pop it right here and then place this
little orange one next to it and the last acro over here now the other parts of my aquascape
have mostly medium light reach with a much less intense flow i have a ton of options here but i
need to think about corals with a lot of movement to contrast the low movement of those acros
let's start with this torch here torches love some good flow and highlight so really only has one
spot which is right here and to balance out some of that movement across the tank here i'm thinking
the goni garden really belongs in this area you know much less slow hits this spot so it's just a
wonderful position so we got two purplish goni's and one yellow goni to work with on the collar
wheel this works great actually because yellow and purple are complementary colors of each other
so that means that the yellow goni will sit nice and pretty here in the middle with these
two other gonies around it i think we should carry on this movement we've got going here on this left
structure and place the hammer garden on this ledge area as well green and orange we're great
with each other bam i also think having a nice zoa garden would look lovely on this right side you
know they add so much color so let's place this red zoa right here and pop that lovely green one
near it pop the orange one right here next to that then the blue zoa's and then these yellow zoas
nice little zoa garden i love it now we have a couple of blastos left and i'm thinking of just
having a little blasto area here you know it would be pretty neat and that my friends is a great
start to a coral layout for my 220 gallon let me know what you think of my layout in the comments
hopefully this video was somewhat helpful to you and thinking about your coral placement design
or even if it wasn't i appreciate you still here still watching you know big shout out to
coral fish zoa and the other fish tanks shown for letting me use their amazing tanks as an example
and also to reeftide for letting me use their corals throughout this video i'm leaving a code
if you want to get any of these corals in the description so you can get that sweet discount
when buying your corals you know after planning your choral layout using this video of course
make sure to smash that subscribe on your way out too would appreciate it