frogspawn detached from skeleton

[tydtran]

Does anyone know whether the soft part of a frogspawn coral can live and grow a new skeleton after separating form its old one? One head of my frogspawn did this yesterday. The skeleton is completely bare and the green tenctacles as a whole are now sitting on the sandbed. It looks like a mushroom. Is there any way to rescue it or does it inevitably die?

 

[PoukieBear]

Sorry, I don't know the answer to this, but I'm taging along to find out.

I've never heard of such a thing happening. I hope it survives.

 

[cfw1199]

i have had a head drop off a couple of times.......it's hard to keep them living though.....one of them had some exoskeleton left on it and it survived for about a month or so and then just died off....the other one died almost immediately....with it sitting in the sandbed as mine was as well....hermits, shrimp and the like mess with it to much to grow the new skeleton IMO.....but I have seen this twice in the last two years...it's like they split and then the head that splits falls off.....kinda wierd but cool if you could get them to live.....but I couldn't....but then again I didn't try real hard either.....

 

[Kellie in CA]

Good Question! I have a Frogspawn that is splitting, but the new head is completely unattached from the skeleton. I'm not sure what is going to happen, but it will be interesting.

 

[Lotus99]

I had some heads fall off a torch. I put them in my frag tank in areas where they could recover, but they didn't.

If heads are falling off, it's not a good sign (usually called polyp bailout). Give your water parameters a thorough checking.

 

[hebygb]

About 6 months ago I picked up a 3-branch Frogspawn from a fellow reefer that was having serious issues with his tank. The coral i got from him was in suspect shape, so I figured the damage was irreparable. I had the polyp drop happen to two out of three torches... The third looked fairly pathetic until I started to dose vitamins and minerals from Kent... now the third torch is thriving and there is a little bud on the side of the branch. If all continues, I will consider this a save. As long as those snails quit knocking it over.

 

[tydtran]

Today, i had another two heads drop off. I am doing a large water change and checking the water chemistry afterwards. It's surprising because everything else is doing OK. I am going to try and place the polyps that detached on some rock in my quarantine tank and see if I can keep them alive.

 

[reef321]

I don't think polyps can grow back their skeleton, and i think after a while it will die, sorry about your corals.

 

[taillonjohn]

this is called polyp bail-out.

Google it, you will learn all about it. the corals dont like your tank, and are trying to seperate from the skeleton to drift away and find a new home, but that doesnt happen in a tank, so yes they die

I hope I'm wrong but this is what it sounds like to me

 

[mscarpena]

This happened to me with my hammer corals when I switched from Reef Crystals to Tropic Marin sea salt. I also stopped dosing Molyblend and Strontium. I attribute the polyp bailout to these changes. I also stopped feeding 2 times per day to once per day and my nitrates went from 50pm to 0 in about 4-5 weeks. I did collect the heads of this coral and put them in some tupperware and they are all doing well except for a few of them. It has been 4 weeks now. No new skeleton, but I plan on a new skeleton growing. If you place them somewhere where you can keep track of them and they will not get lost you will have a much better chance of them growing the new skeleton. I have gone back to my old salt and what I was doing before and all my corals are looking better. Even my zoo's and paly's. I am very disappointed that this happened. I have had this hammer for 4 years now and have not lost one single head off of it until this happened. It is my favorite coral so hopefully it survives. It is a spectacular green and purple. I estimate it's worth at about $300.00++. It had about 45heads on it.