Once a coral eater always a coral eater?

[Jeremey’s reef]

Good morning Reef family, today I want to address a problem I been dealing with for a month or so now. My Moorish idol and CBB are both caught a serious taste for my meaty coral such as my trachy and scoly corals. Obviously this something I do not want happening so I put protection around my coral but it is a eye sore. Today they are completely retracted and the skeleton is visible this is quite disappointing. Is there a way to try and stir them away from bothering my LPS or is this a case where I can’t have one without the other?

 

[qasimja]

my one spot rabbitfish and my coral beauty ate my brain and acans they dont touch anything else 300 dollars wasted now im afraid to get another brain coral lol

 

[Jeremey’s reef]

my one spot rabbitfish and my coral beauty ate my brain and acans they dont touch anything else 300 dollars wasted now im afraid to get another brain coral lol

Yea I’m in that same boat my scoly is gone and my trachy are barely hanging on. I took the shields off after my water change this morning and the Idol went right after both of my trachy’s

 

[qasimja]

Yea I’m in that same boat my scoly is gone and my trachy are barely hanging on. I took the shields off after my water change this morning and the Idol went right after both of my trachy’s

Yea i dont want to try and buy another brain for them to eat it again but thats really the only way to know is to try and add another maybe someone else will reply with good news on theirs not bothering another coral lol

 

[jcook54]

It's my understanding that moorish idols will pretty much eat most of the "meatier" corals. If you really want to keep one then you'll have to limit yourself to corals that they typically don't like. To answer your question directly - I would say it's is a one or the other choice you'll have to make.

 

[Jeremey’s reef]

It's my understanding that moorish idols will pretty much eat most of the "meatier" corals. If you really want to keep one then you'll have to limit yourself to corals that they typically don't like. To answer your question directly - I would say it's is a one or the other choice you'll have to make.

That suck because I wanted build my system around LPS coral like bubble coral, scoly, acans, donuts etc. but like the look of the idol

 

[jcook54]

That Idol will always be a risk to all of the coral you listed. Here's the frustrating thing - they might be fine for a while until the fish gets a notion to try one out and then tears through them real quick. I've kept eels with shrimp successfully for a while until one day the eel figured out it could grab them for a snack and that was that. Things were fine, until they weren't and there was nothing I could point to that triggered it.

 

[Trizzino]

Yep, unfortunately it’s one or the other. You could try to feed heavy to limit the desire but I’ve had the same scenario before. I had a hawkish for 2 years with shrimp with no issues. Came home to him eating them all. After that regardless of heavy feedings shrimp weren’t allowed in my system.

 

[Jeremey’s reef]

That Idol will always be a risk to all of the coral you listed. Here's the frustrating thing - they might be fine for a while until the fish gets a notion to try one out and then tears through them real quick. I've kept eels with shrimp successfully for a while until one day the eel figured out it could grab them for a snack and that was that. Things were fine, until they weren't and there was nothing I could point to that triggered it.

I’ve had that same experience with eels and shrimp, looks like I’ve got some thinking to do [CHARGE=][/CHARGE]

 

[Jeremey’s reef]

I’ve invested quite a bit into trying to keep corals in my Waterbox so I guess I will try some different approach in regards to corals as I have no desire in keeping a FOWLR tank, what are some coral that you guys feel are on the safer side to keep with idols?