Are You Team Branching or Team Wall Hammer?? - Why and Why Not??

[Corals.com]

To us, nothing screams reef keeping and especially LPS Corals quite like Hammers. Their color variation and how their different polyp structures react and look makes them incredibly unique. Their wide popularity and relative abundance only helps to drive their reputation as one of the most popular corals in our hobby. With popularity can also come some challenges and a reputation (both good and bad), especially when there are two separate types.

Here at Corals.com, we absolutely love both Branching and Wall Hammers. It would be impossible for us to pick a side, as we have found great success in keeping and growing both types here at our facility.

We want to hear your story! Which type of hammer do you swear by? Which is your favorite? Which will you never touch again? Colors, countries, polyp type, morphs, and why?
Are you Team Branching or Team Wall? Hopefully, both! Lets hear your thoughts and see your photos down below with ours!​

 

[Corals.com]

BRANCHING HAMMERS

Branching Hammers are widely popular among hobbyists and likely the most common among the two types. With such a wide array of color variations and their tremendous growth, its easy to see why they are so popular! Awesome colors of Yellow, Neon, Orange, Purple Tip, and Toxic (to only name a few) are all throughout our hobby. Having a branching growth structure, they are also fairly fast growers making them extremely fraggable and even more popular and accessible to reefers! We love our Branching Hammers, and always have a great selection in stock. Here's some of our favorite colonies and frags, currently available on our site as well!
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[Corals.com]

WALL HAMMERS

We always say, you can never go wrong with a big, puffy Wall Hammer! While they might not come in as many colors as branching ones, they come in different ones that are unique to them! Stunning blues and multicolors are a beautiful addition to any reef. Being a wall type skeleton structure, they are by no means fast growers. Which is why they usually only come as colonies, as fragging doesn't always yield the best results. Nonetheless, they make up for this in their sheer size in comparison. Wall hammers can achieve massive size! They slowly open up more and more once settled in for long periods in a location they like, and absolutely run with it! Opening up well over 10x their skeleton size. Making them a perfect Hammer Centerpiece on your reef! Here's some of our current favorites!

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[shred5]

I prefer wall. Branching is popular because they are easy to frag.

 

[Corals.com]

I prefer wall. Branching is popular because they are easy to frag.

Walls are great! Makes them slightly more elusive too, since they're not as abundant as the fraggable branches! What kind of walls do you have?

 

[kharmaguru]

I prefer branching because walls have a much lower success rate ( never tried, just internet observation).

 

[reefing102]

I have branching as I’ve never been successful with walls (tried twice). However I’m team wall. Not because of the polyps but the skeletal structure. Many years ago there was a photo of a very large colony (I think it was 2x2 feet or so) on here that showed the skeletal structure with the polyps retracted. That hooked me as I’ve never seen another coral with that type of winding structure (that wasn’t all connected like maze brains).

Just an example of a small wall. Not my pic:

 

[Corals.com]

I prefer branching because walls have a much lower success rate ( never tried, just internet observation).

Cannot go wrong with a nice branching hammer! Never know though, you might be great with walls! Very rewarding to keep especially if you've got the space! What kind of branching hammers do you have?

 

[Corals.com]

I have branching as I’ve never been successful with walls (tried twice). However I’m team wall. Not because of the polyps but the skeletal structure. Many years ago there was a photo of a very large colony (I think it was 2x2 feet or so) on here that showed the skeletal structure with the polyps retracted. That hooked me as I’ve never seen another coral with that type of winding structure (that wasn’t all connected like maze brains).

Just an example of a small wall. Not my pic:
View attachment 32396384

I think we know exactly what photo you're referring to, it was massive! You're right about the skeleton structure, as it is truly one of a kind! (Frogspawn Walls can have a similar structure as well sometimes) Sorry about your past experiences with them. What kind of walls were they? Indo/Aussie and was it a complete piece or cut through the flesh?

 

[reefing102]

I think we know exactly what photo you're referring to, it was massive! You're right about the skeleton structure, as it is truly one of a kind! (Frogspawn Walls can have a similar structure as well sometimes) Sorry about your past experiences with them. What kind of walls were they? Indo/Aussie and was it a complete piece or cut through the flesh?

They appeared to be complete pieces (though I honestly don’t remember). They came from the Indo region as my LFS rarely gets in Aussie stuff

 

[kharmaguru]

Cannot go wrong with a nice branching hammer! Never know though, you might be great with walls! Very rewarding to keep especially if you've got the space! What kind of branching hammers do you have?

Gold that started as 1 head. It's even bigger now.

Splatter that I just recently acquired. It's also bigger now but still 2 heads.

 

[Corals.com]

They appeared to be complete pieces (though I honestly don’t remember). They came from the Indo region as my LFS rarely gets in Aussie stuff

Complete pieces, we'd say, are always better off if you can find them. Just cause they don't have to put any energy into healing! You're not alone though with your wall experience, we have found that the Aussie variety can sometimes just live better than their Indo cousins for some reason! Not always the case, but overall just something we have noticed over the years!

 

[Corals.com]

Gold that started as 1 head. It's even bigger now.

Splatter that I just recently acquired. It's also bigger now but still 2 heads.

Awesome pieces, really nice coloration as well! Always so rewarding watching them grow like crazy! Thanks for sharing!

 

[reefing102]

Complete pieces, we'd say, are always better off if you can find them. Just cause they don't have to put any energy into healing! You're not alone though with your wall experience, we have found that the Aussie variety can sometimes just live better than their Indo cousins for some reason! Not always the case, but overall just something we have noticed over the years!

Are the ones you guys sell complete pieces generally?

 

[Corals.com]

Are the ones you guys sell complete pieces generally?

We get complete pieces and cut pieces in pretty regularly, just depends on how big the colony was and what our wholesalers send to us!