SPS frag size related to mortality rate?

[FrugalReefer]

What is everyone’s thoughts on the size of an SPS frag being an indicator of its chance of surviving in an artificial reef environment? I ask because I recently lost this small Green Slimer to an STN event despite keeping stable conditions for the longest time now and having a mature over 2 year old reef tank.

Temp: 78
Salinity: 1.025
pH: 7.8-8.3
NO3: 0-2
PO4: 0.03
Alk: 8-9
Cal: 400
Mag: 1350

I know people will say I have too low of nutrients to which the only thing I can say is I feed heavy and often flakes, pellets and frozen, I have a fairly heavy bioload with a good number of fish and I have other SPS which are doing fine.

 

[Stealthreefer]

Bigger the frag the more likely it is to survive.
Some hardy stuff doesn't care but in my experience the most successful frags of mine have been larger and encrusting the plug.

 

[thatmanMIKEson]

What is everyone’s thoughts on the size of an SPS frag being an indicator of its chance of surviving in an artificial reef environment? I ask because I recently lost this small Green Slimer to an STN event despite keeping stable conditions for the longest time now and having a mature over 2 year old reef tank.

Temp: 78
Salinity: 1.025
pH: 7.8-8.3
NO3: 0-2
PO4: 0.03
Alk: 8-9
Cal: 400
Mag: 1350

I know people will say I have too low of nutrients to which the only thing I can say is I feed heavy and often flakes, pellets and frozen, I have a fairly heavy bioload with a good number of fish and I have other SPS which are doing fine.

I've had smaller! lol I've had single polyp frags I currently have one ill get a picture of later, no I do not believe size to be the deciding factor, but im sure it doesn't help if something else is going on, but it could have just been that frag there's any number of reasons and possibilities, but no I don't think small size is a guaranteed death sentence in acropora or any coral, how small is a coral spawn?

 

[Tonycass12]

I just hope you got that ity bitty frag for free. I don't even give stuff away that looks like that. I find that a bigger factor with frags is how freshly cut they are. I find frags that are already beginning to encrust tend to do just fine. I don't think nutrients being low plays a big factor but your alk swinging from 8-9 could help stress an already stressed new frag further.

 

[HudsonReefer2.0]

just a frag that didn’t make it. System seems fine and stable from ur post. I have this growing just to see and it’s encrusting. I’d try again. It’s a hardy and available frag.

 

[HudsonReefer2.0]

Bigger the frag the more likely it is to survive.
Some hardy stuff doesn't care but in my experience the most successful frags of mine have been larger and encrusting the plug.

Only way I consider purchasing sps.

 

[FrugalReefer]

I just hope you got that ity bitty frag for free. I don't even give stuff away that looks like that. I find that a bigger factor with frags is how freshly cut they are. I find frags that are already beginning to encrust tend to do just fine. I don't think nutrients being low plays a big factor but your alk swinging from 8-9 could help stress an already stressed new frag further.

$20 unfortunately from my LFS.

 

[FrugalReefer]

I just hope you got that ity bitty frag for free. I don't even give stuff away that looks like that. I find that a bigger factor with frags is how freshly cut they are. I find frags that are already beginning to encrust tend to do just fine. I don't think nutrients being low plays a big factor but your alk swinging from 8-9 could help stress an already stressed new frag further.

I should’ve been more clearer (is that a word?) I keep my alk in the range of 8 to 9.

 

[HudsonReefer2.0]

$20 unfortunately from my LFS.

Mayb they can look u out. I know I would.

 

[PeterErc]

Don’t mind my **** show and blue light,
These nubs are all mariculture, there’s a few more in there as well. Believe it or not, that’s after growing. I can’t complain though, they are all free. Shame that’s what they call a frag these days. I would be embarrassed and have thrown out bigger.
Anyway there was a guy at a LFS that was very successful micro fragging. He would cut tips off and glue them next to each other and they would take off. They were more experimental than anything else. It worked especially for encrusting coral. More edge area to grow out was the theory.

 

[Kfactor]

i hate when ppl sell little nubs for hi dollar i now only get bigger frags i dont care for names and will buy the stuff i like

 

[Kerbash]

I think what people said is definitely true, most of the frags I've lost are frags that are not encrusted, the size dont really matter for me. But I think out of the dozens of frag i lost only two were encrusted.

 

[ReefEco]

+1 on the larger frags surviving. However, I prefer larger, freshly cut frags that haven't encrusted, as I cut the plugs off before QTing them anyway - a practice that people might consider if they want to decrease pest hitchhikers on frag plugs. I find fully encrusted frags that are cut at the base do take longer to recover than similar sized frags that are just cut off at the superglue joint at the base of the frag. Its like the encrusted SPS are saying "what the heck!?" when you cut off the encrusted base and they pout for weeks

 

[ninjamyst]

Acro frags survival rate directly correlates with position of the moon and your astro sign.

 

[Pieces of the Ocean Verified Sponsor]

The amount of polyps per given size can play a big role too. The more polyps a frag has the more biological function the coral can undertake, such as feeding, respiring, photosynthesis, and reproduce asexually (a process called budding). A smooth skin acro with less polyps per given size will need to work a lot harder than a milli with more polyps at the same size to generate energy and grow. I believe this is a main reason why smooth skin such as the purple monster take longer to establish than a tenuis or milli with densely packed polyps. And because it grows slower, people tend to cut smaller frags, and those frags in turn will have lower survivability or take longer to grow. You can't even find purple monster these days, where a 1/2" frag can have less than 10 polyps on it.

 

[CBonito]

i hate when ppl sell little nubs for hi dollar i now only get bigger frags i dont care for names and will buy the stuff i like

Yeah, that kind of twists me up too.

 

[Dburr1014]

I take encrusting or non-encrusting frags.
I can't remember when I lost a frag. I know it was early on and my tank is 10 yo.

This leads me to how are you acclimating OP?

For me, I float to temp, dip in a frag cleaner, in the tank low for a few days. Then mount where I want it.
I also remove from plug after a magnifying glass look-over. That has only been 18 months or so.

 

[FrugalReefer]

I take encrusting or non-encrusting frags.
I can't remember when I lost a frag. I know it was early on and my tank is 10 yo.

This leads me to how are you acclimating OP?

For me, I float to temp, dip in a frag cleaner, in the tank low for a few days. Then mount where I want it.
I also remove from plug after a magnifying glass look-over. That has only been 18 months or so.

My acclimation process is not much different. I float the bag to temp, dip, then place the frag on a magnetic frag rack located on the side of my tank close to the sand bed where the PAR is relatively low. After two weeks or so I’ll place the frag on the rockwork.

 

[thatmanMIKEson]

I've had smaller! lol I've had single polyp frags I currently have one ill get a picture of later, no I do not believe size to be the deciding factor, but im sure it doesn't help if something else is going on, but it could have just been that frag there's any number of reasons and possibilities, but no I don't think small size is a guaranteed death sentence in acropora or any coral, how small is a coral spawn?

all pretty small, but these are from this tank not from a new tank or bought that helps alot coming from and staying in the same tank as a small frag, so a little different situation.... one of the tiny ones is from another system of mine but thats still not the same

 

[Sweet Reef Corals]

What is everyone’s thoughts on the size of an SPS frag being an indicator of its chance of surviving in an artificial reef environment? I ask because I recently lost this small Green Slimer to an STN event despite keeping stable conditions for the longest time now and having a mature over 2 year old reef tank.

Temp: 78
Salinity: 1.025
pH: 7.8-8.3
NO3: 0-2
PO4: 0.03
Alk: 8-9
Cal: 400
Mag: 1350

I know people will say I have too low of nutrients to which the only thing I can say is I feed heavy and often flakes, pellets and frozen, I have a fairly heavy bioload with a good number of fish and I have other SPS which are doing fine.

Just an observation that you can take with a grain of salt but historically my grow out system has struggled with some acros when my NO3 gets below 5. I try to keep it above 10 at the least.