Monti Cap taking over

[jharding08]

I have a green monitpora capricornis that is encrusting on everything and causing damage to other corals.

It is close to my green bali slimer and is causing BTN where it got close.

It is also getting close to another SPS on a plug and I can see the white on the coral from the cap encrusting

The only coral that it backed away from was my torch coral. You could see the frilled edges of the cap where it stopped growing.

Ive broken pieces off of the cap, but it keeps coming back. It encrusts to the live rock where I have to scrape it off.

I have heard of using putty around other corals and then pull the putty off when the cap encrusts on it.

Shouldn't SPS corals be able to fight off a Montipora the way the Euphyllia did? I've seen many tanks where the monti caps are very contained, was this done manually or the result of many coral battles and space achieved?

**I'll post some pictures as soon as Photobucket is done with its maintenance**

 

[swk]

Get rid of it. I would pull my red cap but it's my wife's favorite coral....

Mine is mounted on a 4" square disk and so I move it every couple of weeks so it doesn't go nuts on me. I also break pieces off every 2 months or so to keep it in line. They're easier to manage than the encrusting monties believe it or not

 

[jharding08]

This cap is encrusting on the live rock. I have to scrape it off of the rock where it gets close to the other corals. I need a barrier or something. Its a nice piece, just getting too invasive

 

[.Chris.]

Some people use coral putty to make a barrier, then break off the putty and sell frags.

 

[jharding08]

Some people use coral putty to make a barrier, then break off the putty and sell frags.

More than likely that is what I will have to do. I am getting plenty of Green Apple Monti Cap frags, just from breaking it off so the red cap underneath can get light

 

[jharding08]

 

[serbusfish]

My LFS has an orange Monti Cap in their display tank and it grows into other corals and other corals grow into it, and everything is doing fine. It has grown around a bali slimer and a birdsnest among others so far. LFS told me SPS doing this is normal.

 

[Ratpack]

I feel your pain, I just ripped out a huge Purple monti to make room for other corals and to keep it from encroaching on more desirable corals. I have vowed that my next tank will not have any plating or encrusting corals. Although, some corals will keep the monti at bay. I have a cap growing close to a tri-color valida and the part that is almost touching it is not growing and you can tell the valida is winning the battle against it.

 

[toothman]

It will eventually consume everything, like the blob. Kind of depends what you want it is a cool looking coral but fast grower and invasive. If you do not have a lot of large acros in the tank it will be a real show piece. Picture below is at 18 months at 2.5 yrs I removed it, the cap was 24 plus inches around. It would typically grow 1 plus inch a month. My new tank I concentrated on only acropora species, no caps, stylos, birdnest, milli. giant caps can look great, again just depends what you want to grow

 

[jharding08]

I put epoxy around the corals I want to keep the cap away from and so far it looks like its working

 

[Ratpack]

Anyone have a suggestion to kill off the parts that you can't break off the rocks?

 

[droth335]

Anyone have a suggestion to kill off the parts that you can't break off the rocks?

Kalk paste works great. Just be sure to not get it on any other corals and turn all water movement off for a few minutes afterwards.

 

[jharding08]

I scrape it off with a tool from my fragging kit

 

[reelredfish]

It will eventually consume everything, like the blob. Kind of depends what you want it is a cool looking coral but fast grower and invasive. If you do not have a lot of large acros in the tank it will be a real show piece. Picture below is at 18 months at 2.5 yrs I removed it, the cap was 24 plus inches around. It would typically grow 1 plus inch a month. My new tank I concentrated on only acropora species, no caps, stylos, birdnest, milli. giant caps can look great, again just depends what you want to grow

Was this on the bottom of the tank growing like this? Or is the picture just throwing me off?