People have learned a lot about coral that they did not know a couple of decades ago. The biggest discovery that scientists have made about live coral is that it is actually a type of animal, and not a plant. There are many different types of coral, large and small, and they have different ways of eating, including selecting food and ingesting it. With the new information people have about coral reef, aquarium owners are now able to test out different foods to see what their lovely animal pest will eat.
People who directly feed their coral can do so with a little it of time and effort. Types of coral with visible tentacles and oral orifices ca eat larger foods, such as frozen plankton, phytoplankton and smaller pieces of fish, krill, shrimp, squid and clams. With a little bit more effort, coral reef owners can make food on their own by referring to live coral feeding manuals on the Internet or from a local store. Aquarium owners should try to learn as much as possible about the types of coral that they have in their tank.
Some coral reef species have different eating habits, such as those from the Faviidae, Mussidae, Fungidae and Trachyphyllidae families, which can be fed large foods from the grocery store. Lobophyllia is one of those coral types; it isn't even a problem if the owners feed the wrong food to those types of coral, because they can regurgitate foods that they can't eat through their oral aperture. Aquarium owners should just try to try out different foods with their live coral and learn as much as possible; they are living animals, and should be treated as such.
