dead plate coral having babies

[chefbill]

I bought this dead plate coral skeleton today. It has at least 14 babies, from the size of a pencil eraser up to almost an inch. Also has 3 or 4 nice blue shrooms, and some aptasia. I like shrooms, so bonus, and my peppermint shrimp ate all my previous aptasia, so not worried about those. My question is: Should I pop off the babies, or will they free themselves eventually? The dead parent coral takes up a lot of real estate in my 29g biocube, though this is a cool piece.

 

[tupes]

Eventually they will pop off them selves once they have a good skeleton. The few plates that I've had over the years if I had one die I've always left it in the tank for this reason but I've never had the luck. Do you have a before photo of the plate?

 

[chefbill]

unfortunately no. I bought it as is. $39

 

[Miz40B]

Frag it?

 

[snorvich]

Frag it?

Actually, it is fragging itself. :celeb3:

 

[discocarp]

Awesome. They're called acanthocauli. It is up to you when to frag them. Small plates get knocked around easily.

 

[tupes]

I wouldn't frag it. Let it keep doing what it's doing. Usually once they start doing that they don't stop. You don't want to mess it up.

 

[tupes]

Once you can see the skeleton grow you can pop em off if you want but I'd let them grow and pop off them selves

 

[leveldrummer]

This is commonly known as a plate tree, and just keeps producing baby plate corals, let it be, Grow the plates up to a quarter size or so, and sell them.

 

[chefbill]

I had no idea it would just keep making babies, I was happy with the ~14 there already!

You know, I didnt get into the hobby to make money (lol, I'm way in the red), but I've sold/traded GSP, mushrooms, Trachy, pally and zoa, and now these plates. It's awesome that I'm seeing some return on what I've spent, even though every dolloar goes back into my tank.

 

[leveldrummer]

You will never make money unless you really setup a frag growing monster. But its nice to be able to sell a bit, or even better, trade some people for coral frags you dont have.

 

[chefbill]

Ohh I know I'll never come out ahead, but being able to grow out a frag and sell or trade and still have some left is nice on the wallet.

 

[IndyMatt]

Not only that but you are propagating coral, meaning someone didn't pull it off a reef somewhere. Over time I believe there will be zero corals coming from the ocean itself by law. This can and will be eventually a fully sustainable hobby.

 

[droth335]

Reviving this thread for some input (OP, hope you don't mind). We have a plate coral that has probably 50-60 babies on it ranging in size from smaller than a pencil eraser to about 2x the size of one. I am fine with letting them grow out until the "pop" off (moved it to our frag tank so they wouldn't get lost as easily) but in one part of the skeleton they are like stacked on top of each other so they don't have much room to grow and we are concerned the bottom ones may get smothered (for lack of a better term!). Remove the top ones? Let nature take its course? Thoughts? Thanks for any input!

 

[discocarp]

droth, I'd pop em off!

 

[Brad mac]

I purchased an orange one and ended up with 15 or so plates. Feed them well as youngsters mysis and such and they will grow fast, keep algae and such away from stems and they will keep growing new ones.
I ended up with blue cloves taking over the plate and growth has stopped.

 

[chefbill]

one baby died on the mother, so I traded it to a friend that owns a LFS, he still has it in his shop DT, generates a lot of interest and comments. It hasn't really put off more babies, but there are mushrooms and some hair on the mother so...?

 

[lboud39]

Man, i feel so stupid for tossing my dying slipper coral.