Fragging my Euphies :)

[BigAl07]

I have some FrogSpawn and Hammer Coral that are growing like made and needed "thinning" out. A LFS has requested all that I can get to him so I figured it was time. This will allow me to remove the "Frag Rack" from my 90g and clear up some "Real Estate" in both the 90g and the 10g Frag Tank (forgive the poor pic quality . . .I was more worried about the FRAGS than the camera )

Here is one of the "Mother" colonies ready to be "HACKED" into frags




Here they are "soaking" in an IODINE bath waiting to go into the Frag Tank



And here they are in the Frag Tank already opening back up






And here are some "Micro Heads" that we knocked off during this process. They are the size of a pencil lead or smaller. Who knows if they'll survive or not but it's worth a try right? (Notice the square on the egg-crate in the background for size reference)

[BigAl07]

Some more pics

Chilling in the Frag Tank




and here is a close up of the "Micro Frags"... who knows what will happen . .

[Miltonic]

That's pretty cool what do you use to frag them?

I think I may need to frag my Torch soon since its really starting to take over the middle of my tank.

[lcstorc]

No Al, I am not ready to frag my wall hammer, but you can send me one of those frags. J/K
(He's trying to talk me into it. )

[acemow]

Good job! That was a nice mother colony, nice frags!!

[BigAl07]

Thanks gang! I thoroughly enjoyed doing this last night. It was a BLAST!

Lynn I've got very detailed instructions and they are UBER easy

[lcstorc]

But I am skered.
I think you and Julie need to visit so you can help me. The green one is big enough to frag easy and if you made a house call I would risk the purple for you. We could even try the dippin dots if you are so certain. It is not a huge piece but could be cut in half and still be decent sized.

[BigAl07]

Thank you for the kind words everyone!

Originally Posted by Miltonic

That's pretty cool what do you use to frag them?

Fragging the "Branching" type of silly easy.

Here is how I do it:

Set up a "Frag" bowl/Tub . .. This is where I cut the mother colony and do the "work"

Set up a washing bowl . . These things exude some serious MUCOUS while working with them and I like to wash them off occasionally to keep things clean (it's sticky and stringy)

Set up a dipping bowl . . . any frag I handle, cut, hack, mutilate I like to do a heavy Iodine (Lugol's) dip. Once the frag is mounted I put it into my "Dipping Bowl" and let it stay there while I finish the others and then back to the frag tank.

Ok as for the "Process" it's fairly simple. I only cut branches that are well formed and have a visible "V" between heads and a good amount of skeleton extending from the "V". This ensures I'm not accidentally cutting into any living tissue.

Be warned that the skeleton is hard and sharp in places so wear protection. I take angle cutters (Tin Snips) and cut right in the middle of the "V". Once I have this done I continue with the snips to make the base of the skeleton flat for easy attaching to a disk/plug. Then I epoxu the skeleton base to the disk/plug. I've been only using the green putty epoxy for this but I'm going to pick of some other types before the next time to see if I can get a better looking attachment.

Once they are mounted the go into the "Dip" bowl and once they are sufficiently "Dipped" into the Frag tank.

Originally Posted by lcstorc

But I am skered.
I think you and Julie need to visit so you can help me. The green one is big enough to frag easy and if you made a house call I would risk the purple for you. We could even try the dippin dots if you are so certain. It is not a huge piece but could be cut in half and still be decent sized.

Lynn when we get down there I'll take you up on it. The only "drawback" is the procedure I have for "Wall/Scroll" fragging takes MONTHS for the first step. You're basically letting the coral "Frag Itself" over a period of time. I'll dig up the instructions and shoot em to ya
Would be a GREAT excuse to come see yall though

[BigAl07]

Here are some pics of my frags 24hrs after fragging & dipping. Notice the Micro-Frags are now opening up and just mini versions of the mother animal



and these are just random shots of the frags

[Miltonic]

Thanks for the detailed instructions Al, the frags looks awesome. I can't imagine how long it'll take for those micro frags to grow.

[BigAl07]

Originally Posted by Miltonic

Thanks for the detailed instructions Al, the frags looks awesome. I can't imagine how long it'll take for those micro frags to grow.

Thanks I have no idea but I'm sure a LONG time! This is just an experiment to see how well they grow and if they split later on.

[Rhodes19]

Those are very nice. Is the iodine used as an antiseptic? Those are going to be so sweet.

[twoclowns]

I have owned my branching hammers since I started 10years ago and have been fragging it for 9 years snips work but sometimes the skeleton split up into the flesh so I started using a dremel with a small diamond cutoff blade works like a champ and you can cleanly cut flesh if they are super healthy and the flesh is still present on the stock. I have cut off small babies 1/8" and glued them to rock and grown colonies from them they just take a long time to grow out. There is a video on the internet of E borneman using a wet saw to cut up the walling type of hammers, and he says that they survive 99% of the time. I have a walling hammer currently that is split into 4 main colonies and they actually have 4 babies at the base, I'm going to frag the babies off soon and one of the main colonies and sell them. They are blue hammers if anyone is interested and I know how to ship them properly elastic banded upside down to Styrofoam so the flesh doesn't bang around. been shipping them for a while.

The hammer colony all the way to left above the clam was started 2 years ago with a small baby about 1/8" diameter. The walling hammer is to the left of the green ball brain that is on the bottom right.

[BigAl07]

Originally Posted by Rhodes19

Those are very nice. How long will it take the frags to grow as big as the mother? Also, is the iodine used as an antiseptic? Those are going to be so sweet.

It depends on who gets them and their light/tank. My Euphies tend to grow fairly quickly. I'd say a 3 head would be 10 - 15 in 8 months or so with good lights and good water quality. Some people can't seem to get them to grow very quickly at all and some people get lucky. I get lucky with them because I don't' do anything special and they do very well for me. I don't target feed or anything but they seem to do well in my systems. I'm lucky for sure

[BigAl07]

TC I'm VERY interested in your Blue Hammer. Please keep me posted and if there is a list put me ON it! I'm ALL over that