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To prune or not to prune? (1 Viewer)

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frankc

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This ASD rainbow milli nearly died back when I had the issue with tin in my tank, but it is coming back nicely.

Here it is in October, after it had started coming back.
krXx2Ne.jpg


Here it is today. Not much PE, but I love the color and it's starting to grow up onto the larger dead piece. My question is, should I try to break or cut the taller dead part to let it grow its own way, or will it grow faster by climbing up the dead part?
Q6cbNLT.jpg
 

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It will encrusted back up the former skeleton. Well, at least some of it.
 

Cody

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And your post has inspired me to dip my colony. It's been 8 months now and its recovered, but not back to looking anywhere like it should. Maybe there's something on it. Either way, it pains me every time I look at my tank and still see mine looking like this. I'm going to move it a little too. Maybe it doesn't like where it's at.

Before it took a dive
imagejpeg_0.jpg


As it is today. Still growing, but looking like crap.
20200106_171338.jpg
 

sneezebeetle

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Congrats on saving the frag! Color is coming in really nicely :)

I would try and remove some of the algae, but otherwise the new growth should just grow up the skeleton and cover it up. If you just don't like the look of it, then go ahead and trim it off. Either way, it will grow. I think that by having the skeleton there you offer the growth a road map to follow for a time. If you trim it, it will just toss the map out the window and grow however it wants. Either way its a win because you brought it back.

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frankc

frankc

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And your post has inspired me to dip my colony. It's been 8 months now and its recovered, but not back to looking anywhere like it should. Maybe there's something on it. Either way, it pains me every time I look at my tank and still see mine looking like this. I'm going to move it a little too. Maybe it doesn't like where it's at.

Before it took a dive
imagejpeg_0.jpg


As it is today. Still growing, but looking like crap.
20200106_171338.jpg

I'm sorry yours is in a bit of a funk. I hope it gets back to its former glory. Maybe in 20 years mine will be as big as your colony, hopefully looking more like your "before" picture.
 
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frankc

frankc

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I think I will leave it alone, other than trying to remove the algae. Since Acros generally seem to encrust for a while before growing upward much, maybe if it grows up the dead branch it will think it is just encrusting, but it will look like it's branching out. Sounds good in theory, anyway.
 

RobertP

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This brings up a good point. Do corals reuse old skeleton and just encrust it? Seems that it would want to reuse old skeletons because it would be much faster. I cannot recall if I ever read a study done on this.
 
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Looks healthy Frank. Just cut the old dead skeleton away and let it grow again to see what it turns into! The dead part is kinda taking away from this beauty.

After six weeks of growing, I think the jury is still out. It is growing nicely over the old skeleton, but it's also growing and branching nicely on its own. I still plan to leave it alone, but I'm not sure if that will make it grow faster or not.

xyfZqE0.jpg
 
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frankc

frankc

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Another month or two and the dead part should be completely covered over. However, one of the new branches is nearly as big as the original, so it doesn't look like I really gained anything by keeping the dead part. I still can't tell for sure, but I think it is laying down a thin layer of new skeleton over the dead one rather than simply laying tissue over it. I tried to get a picture showing this but it didn't come out that well - I'll try again when the new tissue is closer to the tip.

vBOrWLx.jpg
 

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Another month or two and the dead part should be completely covered over. However, one of the new branches is nearly as big as the original, so it doesn't look like I really gained anything by keeping the dead part. I still can't tell for sure, but I think it is laying down a thin layer of new skeleton over the dead one rather than simply laying tissue over it. I tried to get a picture showing this but it didn't come out that well - I'll try again when the new tissue is closer to the tip.

vBOrWLx.jpg
Dang. It’s growing very well!
 
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frankc

frankc

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Well, it's been almost 3 months and the dead part still isn't completely covered, but pretty close, and I can conclude from this one unscientific experiment that leaving the dead skeleton did not help it grow faster. This picture is looking straight down on what remains of the dead part, and the white ring around it is new skeleton being laid over the old, so it doesn't truly reuse the old skeleton.

HKfiBHZ.jpg
 
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frankc

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There is still a tiny bit of the old skeleton that hasn't been covered yet, and this pic really shows how thick the new skeleton is, so there definitely was no advantage to leaving the old skeleton.
PA181365.JPG


It has been one year and five days since the original pic of the barely-alive nub covered with algae at the top of this thread was taken. I would say it has recovered pretty well.
PA181366.JPG
 
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frankc

frankc

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Looks good to me. Frag it and stick one on the rack up high and see which one grows faster.

Thanks. Actually, this one is pretty much in the brightest spot in the tank. It's somewhat tempting to try a frag a little lower to see what other colors it might get.
 

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Thanks. Actually, this one is pretty much in the brightest spot in the tank. It's somewhat tempting to try a frag a little lower to see what other colors it might get.
The original colony pic that I posted early this year was in about 350 PAR. From what I was told by the person that sold me the coral, the higher the lights, the more reds and less greens. He mentioned that he had chunks in 900 PAR and they were bright red with very little green at all.

As far as your frags mother colony colony, it was broken into thirds, the middle third was lost, and the two other pieces are happy and healthy now. Growing and coloring up very well. It warms my heart to see the greens, reds, and white tips from growth coming in with nice polyp extension as well!
 
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frankc

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The original colony pic that I posted early this year was in about 350 PAR. From what I was told by the person that sold me the coral, the higher the lights, the more reds and less greens. He mentioned that he had chunks in 900 PAR and they were bright red with very little green at all.

As far as your frags mother colony colony, it was broken into thirds, the middle third was lost, and the two other pieces are happy and healthy now. Growing and coloring up very well. It warms my heart to see the greens, reds, and white tips from growth coming in with nice polyp extension as well!

Mine is sitting in about 185 PAR (what the meter says, then I guess you're supposed to add some percent which I don't remember), but it is still mostly red. The interesting thing is, before it nearly died, it was mostly green, then it recovered mostly red. So maybe that's a great way to enhance coral coloration - nearly kill it and then see if it grows back a different color. I'll let you be the one to test that theory on your corals.

Or, maybe it just takes time for colors to fully develop. I have two Acros - a humilis and a nasuta - which I have had for about a year and have been totally green the whole time, and I expected them to be all green, but just recently they started developing blue tips.
 
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