Hey everyone,
If you've been following our "Grafted" Scoly thread, I thought you might want to see these updates...
Here are two of the specimens that Justin from ReefGen and I made last week. The healing is progressing remarkably, and they are doing great! It will obviously be a while before we see the first signs of color transfer (if it happens). However, the healing is progressing quickly enough that we can say that they are out of the "danger zone" and are potentially even marketable within the next couple of weeks, which is exactly the timeframe that Justin postulated when we were making these specimens.
Unfortunately, I took these photos with my iPhone, and I'm anything but skilled, so the colors are a bit off. Regardless, you can see fairly clearly that the healing is well underway!
Leaving the slight "gap" and gluing the corals together from the bottom skeleton has definitely assisted in the healing process.The theory being that the gap allows for water to reach the "boundry areas" of the coral tissue for good gas exchange, cleanliness, and more rapid healing. Judging by the look of the areas that were cut, I'd say that we're well on the way! This is really rapid! You can clearly (ok, maybe not) see that the "harshness" of the incision areas have definitely "rounded off" with fresh tissue growth, and there is no "warfare" evident between the coral halves.
The "Warpaint/Green" combo is really interesting, because the gap closed very quickly between the two halves, with minimum signs of residual trauma to the corals (I guess we have to call it "THE" coral now, right? Hmm...). What will be interesting to note will be if there are particular varieties that lend themselves better to grafting (i.e.; which ones have a higher likelihood of sharing color materials), although it may simply boil down to the individual.
Anyhow, we reiterate once again that this is not a great achievement in reef keeping, but it is a lot of fun, and the information gleaned from these crude experiments has already yielded interesting information about fragging and propagating these corals that may lead to less expensive, more unusual specimens for the hobby in the very near future.
I'll try to get more/better quality photos of these and the other specimens up in the next day or so. Just thought you might enjoy seeing the progress thus far, so these "quick and dirty" pics give you some idea!
Thanks for the interest!
Scott Fellman
Unique Corals
If you've been following our "Grafted" Scoly thread, I thought you might want to see these updates...
Here are two of the specimens that Justin from ReefGen and I made last week. The healing is progressing remarkably, and they are doing great! It will obviously be a while before we see the first signs of color transfer (if it happens). However, the healing is progressing quickly enough that we can say that they are out of the "danger zone" and are potentially even marketable within the next couple of weeks, which is exactly the timeframe that Justin postulated when we were making these specimens.
Unfortunately, I took these photos with my iPhone, and I'm anything but skilled, so the colors are a bit off. Regardless, you can see fairly clearly that the healing is well underway!
Leaving the slight "gap" and gluing the corals together from the bottom skeleton has definitely assisted in the healing process.The theory being that the gap allows for water to reach the "boundry areas" of the coral tissue for good gas exchange, cleanliness, and more rapid healing. Judging by the look of the areas that were cut, I'd say that we're well on the way! This is really rapid! You can clearly (ok, maybe not) see that the "harshness" of the incision areas have definitely "rounded off" with fresh tissue growth, and there is no "warfare" evident between the coral halves.
The "Warpaint/Green" combo is really interesting, because the gap closed very quickly between the two halves, with minimum signs of residual trauma to the corals (I guess we have to call it "THE" coral now, right? Hmm...). What will be interesting to note will be if there are particular varieties that lend themselves better to grafting (i.e.; which ones have a higher likelihood of sharing color materials), although it may simply boil down to the individual.
Anyhow, we reiterate once again that this is not a great achievement in reef keeping, but it is a lot of fun, and the information gleaned from these crude experiments has already yielded interesting information about fragging and propagating these corals that may lead to less expensive, more unusual specimens for the hobby in the very near future.
I'll try to get more/better quality photos of these and the other specimens up in the next day or so. Just thought you might enjoy seeing the progress thus far, so these "quick and dirty" pics give you some idea!
Thanks for the interest!
Scott Fellman
Unique Corals
