Toadstool Fragging

[Salty Red]

I was wondering if anyone had experience fragging a toadstool. I'm looking for a quick "how to" and how difficult it would be. I appreciate any help.

 

[der_wille_zur_macht]

Slash and burn, baby! They are resilient. If you don't care about "preserving" the mother colony (i.e. it's not your central showpiece) you can just snip off pieces of the disk with scissors, then mount them with your favorite method. An average-sized disk might be able to yield 6 or 8 frags.

Once you have the pieces, dip/rinse in fresh tank water, then mount. You can mount using the lazy method (put them in a big cup with live rock rubble in the bottom and wait for them to attach) or more proactive methods - for instance, tie them to live rock with bits of netting or zipties.

If you care about preserving the parent colony, you might want to just take one or two frags at a time. Or, keep an eye on the stalk - they will often form tiny little buds off to the side that you can snip off and mount.

 

[Eastamherstbias]

This is the one thing I am good at.

Take scissors to the crown of the toadstool and cut it off. Now cut the crown into a various sizes depending on how big the crown is. Leave the mangled base in the tank. The base will regrow a crown slowly in 4-6 weeks.

With the little fragments, place in a basket with rubble rock. There should be low flow in this area so they can adhere to the rock. In 3-4 weeks they will adhere and you can glue them onto plugs. 3 months after that depending on the size cut their crowns and repeat the process.

Good luck.

 

[Salty Red]

Thanks for the help! Fingers crossed, but it sounds pretty fool proof to me.

 

[der_wille_zur_macht]

Definitely is fool proof. Probably one of the easier corals to propagate with a high success rate. The trickiest part is getting the frags to encrust, but worst case, the solution is just "more time" in low flow.

 

[Eastamherstbias]

Cutting Maxi's and Toadstools are probably the easiest things to frag.

 

[der_wille_zur_macht]

As payment for the advice can I get in line for a frag? I haven't had a toadstool in a tank in years and I kinda miss them.

 

[Salty Red]

I will see how this adventure goes and let you know when I frag it again. I actually want to frag it to bring in a piece for an office tank my friend and I started up. I want to keep the "mother colony" in my tank, otherwise I would hack it up and hand it out.

 

[der_wille_zur_macht]

No pressure at all, just making a joke. Hope it goes well for you!

 

[tmz]

I take the buds that form or cut a slice off the edge of the crown and cut it into smaller sections as other noted
. For mounts, the easiest reliable method for me , is to pierce the frag with a wooden toothpick and then crazy glue/and or glue and rubber band the bottom end of the toothpick to a piece of rubble pushing the frag down until the flesh touches the rock. Then break the top portion of the toothpick so the horizontal piece holds the frag down. It will set to the rock within a week and any protruding toothpick can be snipped away. The remainder of the wooden toothpick will decompose and dissappear overtime without any harm.