Frags; mounted or unmounted?

[jamal-188]

Do you guys prefer mounted or unmounted frags when you guy them? I would be using the little plugs and disks from Boston Aqua.

Recently setup a small propagation tank and am curious as to what most prefer.

 

[ERICinFL]

I prefer them mounted. It makes it easier to acclimate them to my lights. I have a shampoo bottle holder with egg crate in it, so I just slide the plugs into the egg crate.

 

[t0mmy108]

mounted and encrusted. shows a little more stability and is a good sign of health. If you're only going to mount and ship right away, then don't bother. I hate freshly mounted frags. I like frags that are cut well before they ship. Give them time to heal, then list them for sale and ship. mortality rate on fresh cuts are higher.

 

[sfsuphysics]

I'm with Tommy, if you're not going to allow the frags to heal up and encrust (that means 2+weeks after fragging) then don't bother mounting.

Other than that I prefer to get frags unmounted, little discs really don't add to the realism of the reef, sure they will eventually be encrusted over but eh.. in the mean time I have little ceramic buttons in my tank

 

[gemxsps]

Depends on coral and shape... I

 

[Covey]

Mounted and encrusted. They take off faster when you get them.

 

[DaddyJax]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=8366885#post8366885 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by t0mmy108
mounted and encrusted. shows a little more stability and is a good sign of health. If you're only going to mount and ship right away, then don't bother. I hate freshly mounted frags. I like frags that are cut well before they ship. Give them time to heal, then list them for sale and ship. mortality rate on fresh cuts are higher.

Agreed.

 

[jamal-188]

For most so far I've mounted them on the plugs and they are encrusting nice on the base, think I'll keep going that route. To sell them unmounted I guess I'd have to just keep the mother colony entact and just freshy snap off piece to sell.

 

[trueblackpercula]

mounted works for me

 

[Rays]

Yeah, what they said :bum:

 

[fishdoc11]

IME fresh cut frags don't do any more poorly than encrusted ones. I have shipped hundreds of fresh cut frags and only one has died in transit from what I can remember. I have also recieved quite a few freshly mounted and only lost a couple of those. As long as the supplier packs well, has healthy stock and knows what they are doing I don't see a difference.
Chris

 

[ChurchBoy]

Mounted to frag plugs. It not only makes it look nicer, but healthier for the frag since you aren't touching the tissue when handling.

 

[MiddletonMark]

I've had good luck with fresh cut.

It also doesn't have the plug/etc to hide hitchhikers [pests, problematic varieties of algae, etc].

Problem is, fresh-cut is hard to tell whether it's fresh off a healthy thriving mother colony ... or a chopped up little coral, IMO perhaps of less thriving health [or newly imported, etc]. If I really don't know the source at all - I do lean toward encrusted, but only then.

I don't mind my encrusted stuff - but I prefer to add as little non-coral to my tank as I can now - and thus fresh-frags work better with my pest-paranoia.

 

[cward]

I prefer unmounted for the reasons that Mark used.

It also doesn't have the plug/etc to hide hitchhikers [pests, problematic varieties of algae, etc].

 

[panic]

Fast shipping with hot/cold packs is most important for me. A fully encrusted mounted frag will turn into a colony sooner though.