my first coral!

[Trickdout69]

im heading up to lps tomorrow to get my first coral. i have had the water tested and all is good. i want to get a green hammer. is this a good choice? i have no other corals in the tank yet. if it is a good choice how to i go about attaching it? i have looked and looked and have seen nothing on green hammer i would like to attach it to a small live rock. can i do this out side of the tank or does it have to been in the water at all times? also i see some people use super glue is that fine? how do i go about handling it?? can i touch it? im sorry for all the questions but i want this to go well so any help will be greatly appreciated.

 

[nolen502]

you can do it out of the water, it will be fine. if you use super glue use the super glue gel.

 

[Trickdout69]

how long can it be out of water?

 

[Aznyoyoboy57]

out the water to glue it into a live rock is fine. i just use super glue (loctite super glue from home depot) and been working for me. what kind of lighting do u have? but should be fine at the bottom of the tank. hope this helps :bigsmile:

 

[Trickdout69]

i have a 170 watt led fixture.

 

[nolen502]

Also, dont glue the fleshy part of the hammer.

 

[ritter6788]

Congrats on your first coral. It's addicting!

 

[Trickdout69]

so i can touch it?? i just glue the hard bottom to a rock and thats it? how long can it be out of the water?

 

[Ryan2112]

yes you can touch it just be gentle you dont want to tear the flesh. just put some gel super glue on the bottom of the skeleton/hard bottom. you would be fine with it out of water for around 5 mins. most people when taking coral out a tank to frag will have a bowl of tank water to hold them in.

 

[Trickdout69]

ok thank you guys for all your help!! i hope it all goes well

 

[Chameleon]

it can be out of the tank for a really long time. I wouldn't hesitate to do 15-30min. Some corals such as zoanthids can actually be shipped out of water and just wrapped in wet newspaper. no worries about taking it out of the water. although we make them sound delicate corals can really take beatings. as long as you have good water chemistry you can pretty much go around smashing corals with hammers and they will be fine. They may be in more pieces though ;)
superglueing the stony part to a rock outside of water is your best bet. If you want to get fancy pick up some of the epoxy putty and sandwich that with some superglue to attach.

 

[Bry]

it can be out of the tank for a really long time. I wouldn't hesitate to do 15-30min. Some corals such as zoanthids can actually be shipped out of water and just wrapped in wet newspaper. no worries about taking it out of the water. although we make them sound delicate corals can really take beatings.

The things I learn on this forum everyday amaze me. Thanks for the info! I always get nervous just having them out of the water to transfer them.

 

[Loki]

You can touch it all over. Lol. Before you go to your LFS stop by lowes or home depot and get some Loctite gel control super glue. It looks like this.

Then once your at the LFS get some coral dip. You would hate for the first coral in the tank to infect all the rest with bugs and such. I use CoralRX and have always had great results. Today I got a shipment of 57 frags in and I dipped every one of them in two separate batches.

You can't tell in the picture but it is a blue bottle.

If they have the "one shot" then get at least one for now.

Once you get the coral home you'll want to acclimate it. The method I use (and I'm sure most of us) is the drip acclimation.

This is all you will need to get it going.

A bowl or resivour of some sort, a length of tubing to slowly transfer water from your tank into said bowl and a clamp to keep it from acclimating your floor.

Like this :)

I also have a valve on my tubing. It is so I can really control the flow rate of the acclimation. If you get air tubing while at the LFS you can just tie it into a knot.

For acclimation I try for a somewhat faster approach than most. Depending on how far off the salinity is is how long I acclimate. The one thing I always do is double the amount of water in the bowl, and then remove half (bringing it back to its original amount). I do this twice.

If my water is only 0.001-0.002 off I usually go for 10-15 minutes and increase 5 minutes for every 0.001 additional they water is off.

Once acclimated time for some gluing. Glue the hard part (bottom) to the rock that you want. With that type of coral having a very jagged skeleton where broken off you may need to use a lot of glue. Especially since your glueing to another rough surface (rock).

Good luck and have fun! :D