A good way to frag?

[scubakid3]

I have a colony of purple hornets on a plug on my frag rack. This stuff constantly grows onto the rack and i end up fragging it and putting the pieces on plugs to give away. I usually take the rack out, put it in a large container of tap water, use a razor to get under the polyps and get them off of the rack, cut them off and dip in iodine. I then mount them onto plugs and there you go. This has worked the past few times I have done this. Being the safety freak that i am, i always wear glasses and gloves. Is there a better way to do this or do i have the right idea? also, kind of a stupid question, how do i get zoas/palys off of rocks onto plugs? I have a nice colony of red people eater palys on a rock and i would like to start fragging them. Any advice is greatly appreciated.

 

[MUCHO REEF]

:thumbsup::thumbsup:

I have a colony of purple hornets on a plug on my frag rack. This stuff constantly grows onto the rack and i end up fragging it and putting the pieces on plugs to give away. I usually take the rack out, put it in a large container of tap water, use a razor to get under the polyps and get them off of the rack, cut them off and dip in iodine. I then mount them onto plugs and there you go. This has worked the past few times I have done this. Being the safety freak that i am, i always wear glasses and gloves. Is there a better way to do this or do i have the right idea? also, kind of a stupid question, how do i get zoas/palys off of rocks onto plugs? I have a nice colony of red people eater palys on a rock and i would like to start fragging them. Any advice is greatly appreciated.

Hello Scuba, there are a few perfectly good remedies to your issue which by the way and to be very honest, it's a great issue to have as you are getting consistant growth :thumbsup: You are indeed doing something very well in your system.

I am not being rude nor trying to do so, but for clarity, anything on a frag plug is a frag, not a colony. A frag rack holds frags until they stablize via acclimation after fragging, for new arrivals or until regrowth begins. If any frag consistantly propagates onto your rack, they are telling you it's time to be moved off said rack. Either off the rack onto the substrate and/or being secured to a mother rock and allowed to mature.

I highly commend you for wanting to give frags away :thumbsup: :thumbsup: 2 thumbs up from me my friend. If your polyps on your frags on your frag rack are propagating onto the rack, you're going to eventually began to kill polyps as you remove them from said rack. In my opinion, you can avoid this by removing this frag from the rack, finding an appropriate size 4" to 5" piece of live rock, securing it to the center of that rock, and allow it to mature into a colony. If you want to continue to share your polyps for free, again, 2 thumbs up, you can attach small 1 inch pieces of live chip/rubble rock 1/2" away from the newly attached frag to the mother rock, and once they settle in and began to grow again, you can break off the rubble rock with the newly migrated polyps and your problem is solved. Trust me, I have done this for 15 years without a single issue. In fact, I had to as my tank has explosive growth to the point every single inch of front facing rock was 100% covered. If you follow what I have just shared, you will resolve both of your issues.

I also commend you on wearing reef safe gloves and goggles.

BTW, there is no such thing as a stupid question. If you don't know, just ask, which is what you did my friend. Again, I mean absolutely no harm or disrespect at all with my above reply. Good luck sir.

MUCHO REEF

PS. In your last paragraph, you stated you had some palys and you wanted to start fragging them. How long have you had them? How many polyps are on this colony and how big is the piece of live rock?

 

[buddythelion]

Here's how I frag my zoas. Use the same concept but on a rock.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-KGAH93qys

 

[scubakid3]

Many thanks to both of you guys. I think i will start doing that for all of my zoas/palys. In response to Mucho Reefs question, I have a small colony of Red People Eaters. They are on a medium sized rock and the colony now has 12 polyps (a 2 months ago it was 2). I'm not quite ready to frag those yet because they are in close proximity to one another. I haven't had any of my pieces on the rack die yet, but i will certainly do what you said. Again, thanks to both of you guys.