LARGE Poly LPS- Where do they come from?

[tjgr34]

I'm not sure if "large poly" is the right description, but I've been wondering about the conservation status and harvest methods for things coral like scolys, wellsos, lobos, acanthophyllia etc. Basically, the really big, open LPS coral. I've only ever seen a handful of examples of people trying to frag these guys (mostly on R2R) and suspect that they are almost always collected from the wild. Slow growth and large size make me think that they probably reproduce slowly, and could be vulnerable to over harvesting. Can anyone shed light on this issue?

 

[Kehaulani]

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[ebushrow]

I know unique corals did a write up on fragging a scoly...Lobos can be fragged like wall frogspawn....acanthophillias, not sure I've seen them fragged...ever.... Trachys, scolys, and welsos can just be picked up from the sandbed without reef destruction....not sure about Lobos. As far as sustainable collection and harvest, they are under the CITES umbrella, so they are tracked...at least by fish and wildlife legally harvested for the U.S. To be honest, other than the U.S. Japan, and Austrailia, I am betting the collection and importing is much more laxed. However, they are mariculturing mass quantities in collection areas such as Bali, so they might be fragging and growing some lps there (other than frogspawn and hammers) but I doubt the information would willingly be shared with hobbyist since that is how they make their living.