Taking coral off plugs

[tmuck44]

Bought some coral frags which were attached to a clay plug. Not really liking the look of the plug in my tank. What is the beat way to remove the coral from the plug? First corals so new to reefing and saltwater in general.

 

[grant778]

What corals are they? That plays a big component in the way to go about taking them off the plugs.

 

[Mark9]

LPS/SPS, I wedge a sharp small knife under it, twist and it pops off.
Zoas, I use a slightly larger knife to "scrape" everything off the plug.
Softies, same thing.
If you can, when scraping, try to get bits of the old plug, makes it easier to glue onto something different.
Some corals (mushrooms, some softies) you won't be able to glue, you'll have to rubberband.
Some softies you can glue.
I have a type of kenya tree that drops babies all the time, I glue them onto rocks.
Xenia, not easy to glue.
But like grant778 said, telling the type of coral will help with the answer.

 

[tmuck44]

Thank you for responding. Its a zoa, duncan and gorgorian!

 

[tubbs2323]

Try to use a razor blade or a small flat blade screw driver, I went to harbor freight and found a lot of useful tools in the store, if the zoas r growing on the plug leave them, u will do more bad than good if u try to scrape them off the plug. If it's a piece of rock with zoas growing on it just pry it off the plug.

 

[NickReef17]

if you have very steady hands, you can try to cut around the corals to very small small pieces and they should fit better in small holes of the rocks, as for the zoas, they will spread and mask the plug but you can try to cut around them. if its a plug with a long shaft on the bottom, snip it off with wire cutters