Waving Hand Anthelia: Complete Care Guide
- Apr 29, 2021
- Anshika Mishra
- 5803 0 0
Along with being expert coral keepers' favorite corals, the Waving Hand Anthelia is also beginners' top favorite corals. They are very similar to your Xenia corals, but much larger and get a lot bigger on their polyps. And as with most of the soft corals, they look really pretty.
Wavy Hand Anthelia
Prices
You will normally spend about $20 for getting a frag, and as you get going towards larger pieces of the Anthalia, they are going to cost a little bit more.
Care Level
They are super easy to take coral, as mentioned before they're a great beginner coral. Also, they're really good about growing quickly, so if you want to take over your tank, then this one is a really good one to try.
Origin
Most of the time, these corals come from the great barrier reef, but they are drawn so well in the tank that now they are aquacultured in various coral farms around the world.
Water Parameter
- Temperature: You want to keep in from 72-78 degrees Farhenheit, definitely want to keep the coral tank warmer, so it would be great if you could keep it stable at 78-degrees.
- dKH: 8-12
- pH: 8.1-8.4
- Salinity: 1.023-1.025
Colors
Normally you will find the pink variety of these corals. They vary between some whites, browns, etc, at times, but mostly those pink ones are what everybody wants.
Diet
So, they are photosynthetic, they will do really well if you are spot feeding them. Some liquid food makes their color very vibrant and also helps them grow a lot faster.
Venomous
Though they are not venomous, you want to keep other corals from stinging them because once they get injured it's hard for them to revive to their original state. They don't do well in coral dips either, so just make sure that you are not letting any kind of torch corals or Hammers speed upon them.
Placement
They will compete against other corals for space and Anthalis will win in nine out of ten cases. They are like your Green Star Polyps, they just grow non-stop. If two rocks are touching, they're going to grab on that rock and continue to grow across it.
The bad thing about that is that they will continue to grow over something like your Zoas, and these Anthalis stretch out really far and they no light will reach your Zoas which will eventually lead to your poor Zoas' stay closed all the time.
So, make sure to place them in a spot where they can take over. Normally, people like to put this coral at the bottom, because they are easier to control on a rock at the corner of the tank away from everything else. They will take over everything if rocks are touching.
The times when you want to take control of these, you can just put them at the rocks that are not touching anything else. This way, they will cover the rock, but they will not be taking over your entire tank.
Current
You definitely want to have a medium to high current, as they are eating and getting food. It gives them the really nice flow they need, it's where they get their waving hand came from. They love a lot of current hitting them, You will know that they love the current is when they are staying longer and their heads are open and spread out.
If there is too much current on them, they'll be shrunk up and you will barely see them come out. So, just watch where you put them.
Lighting
It doesn't tank much to keep these guys alive, just some decent LEDs, or even some T-5 bulbs, whatever you have. But a little bit of high-dollar LEDs will give them some amazing colors, but it doesn't take much to grow them.
Fragging
The best way to frag these corals is by using rubber rocks. So, just place the rock beside the original growth, and once that growth spread out it will spread out onto those rocks that you set beside it, and then you can just pull those rocks off.
It is not recommended to cut their stalks and try to glue them to different rocks, this will just cause too much stress to them and most of the time, they won't survive.
Conclusion
So, that was all you needed to know about the Wavy Hand Anthelia. Just keep up with your water changes, and regularly check the water parameters, in a coral tank you don't want those levels to spike because it definitely hurts them. Calcium and KH are probably your main two minerals, so make sure that they are staying high.
Happy Reefing!
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