Well, I have found the article on this site after the same occurance happened in my tank. I am wondering how long the cuttings took to build a new skeleton when the old one tore away.
I had a damsel push my elegance (which I have had for 6 years) into high current and some flesh tore away at each end. One end had a daughter colony developing for about 6 months. The skeleton had ripped away from that. So out of worry for the main section of the coral itself I cut of each end making sure there were two mouths at least on each. Now only one end had a skeleton originaly.
It is one month since I made the cut. After one week they had no signs of the cut. Fully healed. Each day they seem to be getting heavier and larger.
The big breakthough in this that I see is the fact that they look identical even though only one had developed as a daughter colony. If they both make it and develope skeletons, we may have a way to propigate the healthy older elegances that have a higher survival rate. Lowering the need for harvesting in the wild. It would be a great thing as a hobbyist to be able to do. So many horror stories of the current collections that I would love to be able to share the older ones that have come from shallower depths and can handle a captive reef life.
I think the key is having a well established large elegance. This will more likely have mouths away from the skeleton that can be cut. Place them in low current or build them some sort of protection. I took broken pieces of dead plating coral and sectioned off along the glass like a fence. Holding the two cuttings in their own space in the front corner of the tank. It has been an exciting experiment.
Just my two cents.
Ryan
I had a damsel push my elegance (which I have had for 6 years) into high current and some flesh tore away at each end. One end had a daughter colony developing for about 6 months. The skeleton had ripped away from that. So out of worry for the main section of the coral itself I cut of each end making sure there were two mouths at least on each. Now only one end had a skeleton originaly.
It is one month since I made the cut. After one week they had no signs of the cut. Fully healed. Each day they seem to be getting heavier and larger.
The big breakthough in this that I see is the fact that they look identical even though only one had developed as a daughter colony. If they both make it and develope skeletons, we may have a way to propigate the healthy older elegances that have a higher survival rate. Lowering the need for harvesting in the wild. It would be a great thing as a hobbyist to be able to do. So many horror stories of the current collections that I would love to be able to share the older ones that have come from shallower depths and can handle a captive reef life.
I think the key is having a well established large elegance. This will more likely have mouths away from the skeleton that can be cut. Place them in low current or build them some sort of protection. I took broken pieces of dead plating coral and sectioned off along the glass like a fence. Holding the two cuttings in their own space in the front corner of the tank. It has been an exciting experiment.
Just my two cents.
Ryan