SPS recommendations

[jef4y]

I am looking to branch out a bit more into the SPS world to occupy some of the space in the top of my tank. I have plenty of light and flow, ca reactor, etc, so I shouldn't have much of a problem there.

Right now I do have 2 SPS pieces that were given to me with some rock I bought a while back. I'm not 100% sure what they are but think one is an acro and one is a monti of some variety (pics below - if you can identify that would be GREAT).

I'm looking for recommendations on common (read - inexpensive) SPS pieces that are generally hardy. Don't need to be fast growing or anything exotic (nobody would know the difference between a $10 piece and a $1000 piece in my tank anyhow).

The area I'm looking to put them would be about 4-5" under water.

The tank is a 60 cube and is well matured.

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Other existing tenants at the moment.

Large colony of Candy Cane LPS
Large colony of trumpet LPS
5 FL Ricordea's of various sizes/colors
1 rock of green mushrooms
small frag of yellow zoas
1 fuzzy green birdsnest
1 small colony of black sun corals

1 larger Rock/Flower anemone
1 medium RBTA
2 Osc clowns
1 lawnmower blenny
1 green mandarin
~25 or so members to a clean up crew

 

[jcusmarine]

Honestly, you may like Montipora Digitata. I don't have any, otherwise I would gladly give you some. There are several nice colors to include, German Blue, Bright Orange, Green & Purple....

 

[misu]

I still have some smaller pieces of Bird of Paradise that you can have for cheap, hardy and fast growing. I have some purple digitata frags too

 

[dvara78]

Anyone know what that coral in the first pic is?

 

[oz]

Dunno but it's nice looking.

 

[ralph atl]

a blue millie, a blue tort, pearlberry, and a garf bonsia. My 4 favorite aco's.

 

[markl]

Fast grower and looks good is the ora red planet.

 

[jef4y]

Just reading up on the multitude of types of Montipora & Acropora and they both (respectively) seem similar with Both being peaceful, Monti's requiring medium light, moderate flow, and Acros requiring Med-High light and Med-High flow.

Kinda tough doing homework on corals before you go to the store. LOL.. You get there and there's always something different which pops out.

I'm really digging the look on the Millie's. The digitata's are cool too. Heading to Creation Reef to pick up some other things tonight and will check out what they have.

 

[slinky]

The first one looks like deepwater acro

 

[jef4y]

That top one really started to color up nicely once I got it high in the tank. The tips are nice and purplish and the stalks are more of a pale pink. Its polyps extend around 1/4" when out full. It's a pretty neat piece.

The other green piece has good polyp extension too, almost around the clock. They wave around nicely in the current.

 

[lilrobb]

Slinky;557612 wrote: The first one looks like deepwater acro

Not, nematocysts are far too close to each other...

 

[rolo65]

I have some olive green monti cap you can have...

 

[Jaycen B.]

I'll give u a frag of this if you want it.

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[jef4y]

WOW! Thanks for the offers guys!

We picked up a small colony of Blue Millie which is absolutely gorgeous last night. I want to get this one settled in before I add any more, but really appreciate the input and advice of everyone here and offers for free (and cheap) pieces!

Jaycen, is that a fuzzy green birdsnest? I have a piece of that which is growing pretty well (forgot to list that on my tank list). The bizarre thing with it is that I have to keep it in the shade. Even at full depth (24" plus about 7" of space above the water), if it's under full light (T5's) they retract and bleach bone white in HOURS. But in the shade, they extend and flourish like mad. Very weird.

Anyhow, I will post up some pics after this weekend when I get it moved up top.

Thanks again, and will let you guys know when I'm ready for another piece!

 

[corigan]

I have some SPS' I can hook ya up with. I do have some redbugs, so you would want to treat/dip, but you can grab em for free if you want. I have 5 different colors of Monti Caps (Red, orange, peach, idaho grape, green purple rim), a purple polyp birdsnest, a green stylophora, an orange digitata, a starry night acro, stuber stag, 2 different tri-colors, joes the coral, and a bennet tort I am willing to frag off of. I already have the stuber, ora tri-color, and a few different colored monti-caps on my frag rack.