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The elegance coral project - fragging Catalaphyllia jardinei
I bought this Australian elegance early last December with the intention of one day fragging it. It arrived much larger than I anticipated and since it has grown and done well for the past 8 months I've decided to cut it earlier than I originally planned.
Some relevant system info: All lighting are 250W DE Phoenix 14K bulbs in Lumenmax 3 pendants. There is a little over 200gal total system volume. System has been running for 5 years. Nitrate and phosphate have been undetectable for the past year. I target Ca 420 Alk 9 and Mg 1400 but I'm generally higher. The elegance: Has been kept slightly behind one of the pendants in low to moderate flow for the 9 months I've had it. It was sold to me as an Australian by J&L Aquatics. I feed it bits of silverside, krill or squid several times each week. There are no fish or crabs in the frag tank with it. Its quite sticky, so sticky it actually killed and presumably ate one of my turbo snails... December 4 The day after bringing it home. May 14 It completely inflated during the day and then closes up completely at night. You can see in the night time shot how much new skeleton has grown since the December pictures. I've actually taken it to a wet tile saw already and cut 1" off of the base to make the skeleton shorter so that it wouldn't sit so high and would be more stable. June 13 August 2 From the top down through my viewing box in the new frag trough sump. After the lights went out with the aid of a little liquid courage from Sailor Jerry I carefully removed the coral to a bucket. I ran it through the bandsaw twice to make three pieces, two with one cut and one with a cut on both ends. My bandsaw looking a little gooey. I use a few short lengths of PVC plumbing to brace each of the sections upwards. August 3 The next day the triplets are completely open and looking like nothing happened, August 7 They're still alive but haven't shown much signs of healing. August 9 During the day they continue to inflate as usual. You can see that their internal organs are still showing. August 13 By now an open brain would look almost completely healed but the elegance still show their organs and even some small amount of discharge... I have no idea what that was. It kind of freaked me out because it looked like something was feeding on it. August 15 August 21 Finally after nearly 20 days I see some clear signs that they are healing up. This cut still needs to pull the rest of its organs in. August 29 Last night I took pictures of all of the cut ares to show how they've progressed so far. Two of them look completely healed over while the other two still need another week or more from the looks of it. I'm amazed at how long this has taken. The trachyphyllia that I cut back in May had pulled its guts in and grown a thin layer of tissue after only 10 days. I'll post some more pictures again next weekend. Maybe by then all of them will have completely healed over.
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"We shall dive down through black abysses... and in that lair of the Deep Ones we shall dwell amidst wonder and glory forever." - H.P. Lovecraft Old 120gal Tank Journal New 225gal Tank Journal May 2010 TOTM The 10th Annual Prince George Reef Tank Tour Last edited by whatcaneyedo; 08-29-2010 at 05:40 PM. |
#2
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so you selling me a frag of it?
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#3
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I wonder if you sealed the cutside with crazy glue or glue + sand might help
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I don't want to sell any of these for a little while. I'd like to observe them longer until they at least start to grow new skeleton over their cut areas.
I've had great sucess with all of the healthy LPS I've fragged by simply leaving their cut areas exposed and allowing them to heal on their own. I think its the same as when we get a cut on our bodies. Smothering the area under a bandaid inceases the likelyhood of infection and slows the healing process.
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"We shall dive down through black abysses... and in that lair of the Deep Ones we shall dwell amidst wonder and glory forever." - H.P. Lovecraft Old 120gal Tank Journal New 225gal Tank Journal May 2010 TOTM The 10th Annual Prince George Reef Tank Tour |
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Wow, thats brave! Nice work!
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Christy's Reef Blog My 180 Build Every electronic component is shipped with smoke stored deep inside.... only a real genius can find a way to set it free. |
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Nice job! and ballsy too!
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225g reef |
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Pretty cool. I would'nt mind being on the waiting list once they are for sale. I should bring my pagoda cup and tongue coral over and let you hack them up with that bandsaw. They're getting too big for my liking.
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In exchange for letting me keep a small frag of the pagoda I could do that. I don't think I would need anymore than a single polyp as I'm just curious to try one as I've never owned a pagoda before. Some time on a weekend would be best. Just give me a shout and bring each in its own bucket with plenty of water.
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"We shall dive down through black abysses... and in that lair of the Deep Ones we shall dwell amidst wonder and glory forever." - H.P. Lovecraft Old 120gal Tank Journal New 225gal Tank Journal May 2010 TOTM The 10th Annual Prince George Reef Tank Tour |
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Looks awesome man. Ill be watching your frag thread closely now to hopefully catch one.
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"I think were doomed." "Nah, unless they got any big, giant robot camels I think were ok." "Ah.....Jim.......robot camels" |
#10
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Quote:
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