The larger coral in the front of this picture is a green polyp Sarcophyton. The coral came with two nice size heads. When we cut the first head off it grew the two heads that are on top. Last week we cut off the bottom head. You can see how the stalk is already growing new polyps.
You can see the rubber bands we used to attach the two white cuttings. This is the first soft coral we have ever seen that grows so fast that the two sides of the cutting often grown back together after the rubber band has cut it in half.
|
Notice how the top of the cut base has already started to grow new polyps. The top cutting grew so fast that the caps grew back together after the rubber band cut them apart. The lower cutting has the two stalks that we get when we rubber band a healed Sarcophyton to a Reef Plugtm.
The base of the white Sarcophyton will grow a new head during the next semester. These types of coral comes from a lagoon - a shallow body of water, especially one separated from a sea by sandbars or coral reefs - environment so they do well in systems that do not have large skimmers. We have found that all of the soft corals grow very fast when we treat the water with Sally Jo's Magic Reef Dusttm. The Reef Dust is made from a fossil petrified coralline algae that grew at the mouth of a geothermal river in an ancient Idaho ocean.
This picture shows two of our newest soft corals. The coral on the left is a white Lobophytum that grows very fast. The other cuttings are from the white base in the last picture. We often have the soft corals growing close together and they do not damage each other as much as small polyp stony -SPS- corals do.
During the next two semesters we will be trading for as many strains of these soft corals as we can get. The first cuttings of these white corals will soon be sent Arizona to be tested for cancer treatments.
1. Cut the head off of the base as close to the top of stalk as possible. Use clean sharp scissors. After you have rinsed the cuttings in reef water, you can put them in a gravel tray with light and water flow for three days. We use extra SeaChem Reef Plus while the cuttings heal. When the cuttings have hardened we use rubber bands to attach them to Reef Plugstm. The cuttings are placed on a cutting rack in a tank with good lighting and moderate water flow. DO NOT use any type of wave maker because the changing currents cause the cuttings to work loose. |
FOR THE LAST 5 YEARS WE HAVE WORKED VERY HARD TO PURCHASE, TRADE, AND SAVE AS MANY TYPES OF CORALS AS WE CAN.
We are having a special on all of the coral cuttings. WHEN YOU PURCHASE 5 AT THE REGULAR PRICE OF $100 WE WILL GIVE YOU TWO FREE CORALS!. If you have any questions please use this form to ask them. WE WILL PHONE YOU AND HELP YOU PICK THE BEST CORALS FOR YOUR REEF AQUARIUM. We will continue to provide the most current data on reef farming for both education and profit. |