Can someone clairfy "Mariculture" Coral to me?

[Ira]

So, I am going to be doing an "eco" reef here soon, only using captive propigated livestock and have some questions about Mariculture.

I know mariculture is supposed to be eco freindly and better than harvesting wild coral, but where do the mariculture farms get the SPS that they are mounting to the plugs?

Mariculture frags look great, but when I look closely at them, most are large chunks of coral barely encrusted to the plug they are on, which tells me that the big branches came off a larger, more mature colony. Do they grow these colonies at their facilities or are these simply "Chop shops" that are closer to the reef?

Also, do the mariculture shops provide any benefit to the reefs, ie replanting reef with frags from their shops?

These are just my assumptions from looking at the material offered for sale, I am hoping that someone with direct knowledge of how these facilities works can give me some better insight.

Thanks,

Ira

 

[jdhuyvetter]

Mariculture are corals grown in the wild (usually lagoons or on bare bottom adjacent to the reef). They are "chop shops" in the sense that the pieces are removed from the and attached to plugs for grow out.

The plus side to the reef is that they are only removing a handful of pieces at a time to grow out and the parent colony is left on the reef.

 

[joshPensacola]

are they easier to keep like aquacultured corals? or is it just that the colonies are "responsibly" harvested.

 

[SantaMonica]

That's a good question. One would think not, since maricultured would be accustomed to larger food amounts, and (by definition) proper flow and lighting. However if the frags could make it long enough to re-establish new zoox and feeding responses, then maybe they'd be the same afterwards.

 

[billsreef]

The term mariculture really just means aquaculture of marine organisms. That said, in the aquarium trade, "mariculture corals" typically means just what jdhuyvetter explained. As a result, "maricultured corals" are grown the same basic environment as wild collected colonies. While this is better as compared to wild collected in terms of sustainability, they are grown in the same conditions as the wild collected colonies and therefore aren't any hardier in terms of transferring to our tanks.

 

[TampaSnooker]

Then there's the pest issue. Mariculture concentrates single or similar species in an area, making them prone to species specific pests - nudis, flatworms, etc. Dips remove adults, but eggs easily get through.

Obviously though, mariculture is still far superior to wild harvest.

 

[sucker_fish]

I am no expert but I understand that maricultured is the process of growing out corals in the ocean in a designated area, aquacultured is growing out the corals in a controlled environment such as a coral farm or in your aquarium. Not sure about the specifics of where the corals come from contributing to the process. Is a coral that is wild collected and grown out in an aquarium then considered an aquaucultured coral? and a frag from a reef tank attached to a plug and tossed into a lagoon to grow out then considered a maricultured coral? How many generations of frags from wild corals should be grown out before being considered aquacultured? I too would like more feedback on this...

 

[kreef82]

I don't know the answers for you sucker fish. But I do know no one should be putting anything from their aquarium back into the wild. big environmental no no.

 

[mt4sure]

I always wondered what "maricultured coral" meant too. Glad I got some info while browsing through the forums. Gotta love RC.

 

[jdhuyvetter]

Is a coral that is wild collected and grown out in an aquarium then considered an aquaucultured coral?

The parent colony would always be considered a wild colony. However, any cuttings taken from that colony and grown out would be considered aquacultured.

 

[oceanarium]

'Mariculture' Simply means the aquaculture of organisms in their natural environment.

Where the brood stock comes from has no bearing on the matter.

 

[biggles]

In Aus we have a very small and limited frag availability. The only frag i have seen in the last few months was a small birdsnest frag which i grabbed, other than that it used to be only full wild colonies in general that were available but now is see many broken off branches for sale rather than the entire colony. I asked about a small pink and cream 3" branch which was $40- the same price as full 3-4" colonies and my LFS guy said ' that's strawberry shortcake and the collector only supplies small bits from the colonies he harvests from now that he knows what it is '.
It's actually great to see this as he is probably doing it from a pure business sense, not to save the coral for the greater good but either way the colonies are removed at a much slower rate and branches are much better to buy and place than full colonies which take up a lot of space very quickly - win win. They both take weeks or months to acclimatise being wild so you never really know what you're going to end up with color wise...... it's like reef gambling