Why Do People Lay Frags Down on Frag Plugs

[jda]

I have always wondered this and never found a good answer. Does anybody have a good answer?

Just curious.

 

[Guttersnipe]

I think the cuttings are supposed to cover more area of the plug which will fully encrust the plug faster than mounting it vertically.

 

[Centurio]

Some SPS will encrust faster and table more if they are situated like that.

 

[jda]

Do you both believe this is beneficial? How would forcing a coral to table that is not a tabling coral be good? I get it for an efflo, but a stag, austera or tort?

 

[Centurio]

Do you both believe this is beneficial? How would forcing a coral to table that is not a tabling coral be good? I get it for an efflo, but a stag, austera or tort?

Beneficial in what way? In our tanks we oftem "force" corals to grown in manner that they possibly wouldn't as a wild colony. Many SPS look completely different and grow differently under different flow and flow patterns. Is that a bad thing? If the colony is healthy, it's healthy whether it's tabling and encrusting more or if it's branching in different patterns. How a coral branches doesn't determine it's health I don't think.

 

[hart24601]

I don't think it will make a stag table exactly, but just encrust more. I think it's more the surface area that is exposed to the lights, when a frag is vertical the tip is pointing at the lights, but the sides are lit indirectly, when flat the entire side of the frag becomes the top and is directly facing the lights which provides more direct surface area facing the lights, in theory at least. Trace a frag with a par meter holding the sensor parallel to the coral tissue (that is facing sideways on the sides and only facing up at the tip) and I bet you see a lot more PAR when lying the frag flat on the plug.

 

[Greybeard]

Just out of curiosity... Do you believe, when a storm, or even an animal brushing up against it, breaks a frag off on a reef, that the frag ends up landing point up?

Laying the frag on it's side ends up giving you a broader, more secure base, as the colony grows.

 

[jda]

Talking with farmers in Indo a few years ago, they don't lay them down because they can get more areas for silt/debris to settle up against, develop bacteria issues, diseases and tissue death - they mount them the way that they are growing... usually vertically. I open to the fact that nature and captivity can diverge in this sense since fragments don't usually get lost in the silt and sand in our tanks... but I guess that I still get really irked when I see a nice frag that I want and it is laying down on a plug knowing that I have an extra year before it becomes something in my tank... saw a stag like this at a show this weekend.

 

[bubbaque]

Talking with farmers in Indo a few years ago, they don't lay them down because they can get more areas for silt/debris to settle up against, develop bacteria issues, diseases and tissue death - they mount them the way that they are growing... usually vertically. I open to the fact that nature and captivity can diverge in this sense since fragments don't usually get lost in the silt and sand in our tanks... but I guess that I still get really irked when I see a nice frag that I want and it is laying down on a plug knowing that I have an extra year before it becomes something in my tank... saw a stag like this at a show this weekend.

They lay it down for the exact opposite of this reason. They say laying it down allows the frag to encrust and feel secure faster than one that is only mounted on the cut end. Almost all the frags need to encrust first before shooting up new branches. Don't you want the encrusting stage to be over faster to get the new branches up?

 

[jda]

I feel that this is complete and utter nonsense. I can have a 8-12" colony from a vertically mounted frag in 2 years with a base not quite as big as the canopy. If the same frag is laid down, then it is a year before I have a 2 inch "colony," it wasted all kinds of energy growing branches that will compete with each other and need trimmed. I have seen them before too that take months to attempt a 90 degree turn from what was the top of the frag.

I would like to know who "they" is whom thinks that this is a good idea. Chalias does not lay their stuff down when MCing. Neither does Adam or Jared and I respect these guys.

Do people just not know how to secure them vertically?

...maybe I am the only one who gets irked by this... in which case, disregard my usual doochieness.

 

[bubbaque]

They probably lay it that way so people don’t get upset over it. Nobody likes the look of an empty tank when the frags are layer down.

Mike Paletta is the one I seen say it grows faster this way.

Most corals don’t just grow from the tip. I’m not sure if any of mine actually have. They seem to sprout a new branch out the side and it takes off from there. Or it encrust and a branch starts from the bottom.

 

[hart24601]

I can't say I have ever cared how people mount their corals....


I guess one could test it if they really cared, would be interesting to see mass vs length for the measurements and also if the starting size of the frag makes a difference. And how much, if any, the coral are fed impacts those results. Since there are some good articles showing how much feeding baby brine speeds up acro growth one would think mounting in such a way the maximum number of polyps can catch food could lead to faster growth if fed.

 

[Reef Jeff]

Funny how times have changed in reefing. Twenty years ago I never even heard of a frag plug. We just cut off a frag and glued it to a rock in whatever orientation we preferred.

 

[bubbaque]

I think I have plenty of pink lemonade that I might just try this out.

 

[Bpb]

The times I’ve experimented with this, the sideways mounted branch takes FOREVER to encrust and start forming new branches. I’ll never mount like this again. Vertically mounted branches always grow much faster for me

 

[happyhourhero]

I find that vertical mounts allow for a better start and for the acro to decide what is the best route to take. I have had some encrust forever and send up branches elsewhere, some that just seem to start branching in all directions right off the original frag and kind of just expand and I have had some grow on up the original frag and barely encrust.

 

[29bonsaireef]

I think there are a few reasons it's done 1.) An awkward shaped frag 2.) The side glued down was more on the shaded side of the coral (less color) or 3.) They just don't care. I personally believe laying a coral on its side will increase encrusting rapidly, but that just my experience. It may take longer to grow out branches, but when it's ready to go it goes. I don't believe theres a right or wrong way to glue down a frag, it's personal preference. Like someone else mentioned above about natural reefs. When they're hit by tropical cyclones it can take out all branching corals. The entire reef restarts from fragments and branches scattered across the bottom in various positions. There are positive results from either side of the debate.

 

[larangcon]

Some reefers think this is a faster way for a coral to encrust, which might be true. I don't personally like this look too. What I do to branch out faster is to cut a quarter inch from the tip (the frag need to be about an inch high before you cut the tip) you can see 4 to 5 new branch come out in a short time. I then glue the tip really close to the frag that I cut from, this encourage the encrust process. It's like trimming a plant to encourage more growth, same in corals also

 

[CoralNerd]

This thread needs a picture lol
I cut this frag and I was surprised how quickly it encrusted.

 

[James Johnson]

I disagree about the growth, I frequently purchase "logs" as I like to call them and in six months time I have more spikes coming off them than any single spike frag I have bought. Also they are typically larger and cheaper than the single spike standing up frag. And if your looking to frag it out more spikes = more frags sooner