Quick route to mini colony

29bonsaireef · Oct 26, 2018

I've heard of reefers doing this before, and have tried myself with BN and Red Planet acro to create a faster colony. Wonder why this technique is not used more often in the reefing community. Seems like a great way to get a coral from frag size to mini colony or colony in a shorter period of time. Very cool to see aquaculture having such a positive impact on our reefs.

xiaoxiy · Oct 27, 2018

I suspect that as hobbyists, we are already experiencing the accelerated growth rates secondary to fragging. As mentioned in the video, it can take up to 2-3 years for a juvenile coral (from spawning) to encrust a 1 inch plug vs a few months from fragmentation... In the hobby, it doesn't take us years to grow corals 1 inch, it only takes us a couple of months or less.

jda · Oct 27, 2018

Are you talking about suspending the corals with twine/rope/wire? People have been fragging for 50 years.

When we were in the Gulf, we were next to a conservatory that had "trees" and "nets" full of A. Palmatta. The gal that was there said that they did it to keep them from getting lost in surges and storms, not so much for growth. They were about a year away from remounting thousands of them on the reefs.

29bonsaireef · Oct 29, 2018

jda said:
Are you talking about suspending the corals with twine/rope/wire? People have been fragging for 50 years.

When we were in the Gulf, we were next to a conservatory that had "trees" and "nets" full of A. Palmatta. The gal that was there said that they did it to keep them from getting lost in surges and storms, not so much for growth. They were about a year away from remounting thousands of them on the reefs.

No, talking more about planting multiple frags of the same coral all in the same area. I agree, fragging has been around forever, and I don't think they are talking about increased growth just in the frags. They are creating colonies with lots of small frags growing together that would've taken a much longer period of time if it'd been one piece growing out.

For instance, if someone we're to place 5 small frags on a tile vs 1 normal sized frag. Would the 5 small frags encrust the whole tile earlier and begin to grow into a colony faster? That's more what I was getting at. I personally think it would "appear" to grow much faster as each small frag encrusts in every direction as fast as the other. In the time you have a single frag base out 1" you have 5 that based out 1" and fuse together. Could have a tile fully encrusted in 1-2 months and ready to blow up into a colony.

DesertReefT4r · Oct 29, 2018

If you take a larger frag and cut it into several smaller frags and plant those frags on some rock in a small group in time they will grow together and make a larger colony faster. Joe at the Long Island aquarium does this in the 20,000g reef.

Ibn · Oct 29, 2018

What I'm currently doing with one of my pieces.

29bonsaireef · Oct 29, 2018

Ibn said:
What I'm currently doing with one of my pieces.

Nice, that is definitely micro fragging.. Keep us updated on the progression of this. Will be interesting to see how it turns out.

BigJohnny · Nov 1, 2018

Ibn said:
What I'm currently doing with one of my pieces.

I'm afraid those might be too small, but who knows. Hopefully you prove me wrong! Maybe not too small for some other corals but I'd be surprised if they all survive as acros. The middle one should at a minimum though.

Ibn · Nov 5, 2018

How the microfrags are doing as of yesterday. They're all hanging in there with the exception of a couple of them since they were so small that I accidentally shattered the skeleton when I cut them (8/9 o'clock positions).

CoralWealth · Nov 6, 2018

I will follow along and maybe do this with some of my cheaper frags in my frag tank and see how they do.

jda · Nov 6, 2018

They probably were not micro fragging the A. Palmata - that is why you see them hanging. The LPS is what they were micro fragging.

IME, the larger frag will grow faster than a bunch of nubs, but the only way to know would be to weigh them instead of looking at them, which I never did. Some of them are healing nicely.