Need some major zoa pruning

[John3]

When I put these zoas in I never thought they would grow this fast. I’m now a bit disappointed I didn’t prune these when it was more manageable.

I’m looking for anyone’s experience pruning this many zoas. I would probably like to cut away 2/3 of them. Is that feasible? Most these have very long stalks from be so crowded. My guess is I have about 150-200 sunny Ds, 60 armour of God’s, 40 cats eyes, and a bunch of blowpops that need to go. I’m considering trying to drag them if that’s not a terrible undertaking. The top rock could be taken out, the rest can’t.

 

[Oscaror]

When I put these zoas in I never thought they would grow this fast. I’m now a bit disappointed I didn’t prune these when it was more manageable.

I’m looking for anyone’s experience pruning this many zoas. I would probably like to cut away 2/3 of them. Is that feasible? Most these have very long stalks from be so crowded. My guess is I have about 150-200 sunny Ds, 60 armour of God’s, 40 cats eyes, and a bunch of blowpops that need to go. I’m considering trying to drag them if that’s not a terrible undertaking. The top rock could be taken out, the rest can’t.

Problems I wish I had ;Hilarious #reefsquad

 

[Mike1995]

I don't know how to frag or trim yet but if you do figure it oit is there a chance you'd sell some of the trimmings??

 

[John3]

Problems I wish I had ;Hilarious #reefsquad

Yeah I didn’t expect these to spread this fast. The sunny Ds for example went from 2 heads to probably 250ish in less than a year. They have kinda stalled out on new heads since they don’t really have anywhere to go now.

I guess my biggest mistake was put so many dead center on my rock work.

 

[kschweer]

What I would do is brush them with something close them up. Then using a scalpel or xacto knife cut the flesh around the frag you want to make. Once cut use a cheap chisel to break off the surface of the rock they are on. Once you get this off glue the frag to a plug. You want to try to babe some rock left under the frag as gluing the flesh rarely will work out long term.

 

[phil bevilacqua]

When I put these zoas in I never thought they would grow this fast. I’m now a bit disappointed I didn’t prune these when it was more manageable.

I’m looking for anyone’s experience pruning this many zoas. I would probably like to cut away 2/3 of them. Is that feasible? Most these have very long stalks from be so crowded. My guess is I have about 150-200 sunny Ds, 60 armour of God’s, 40 cats eyes, and a bunch of blowpops that need to go. I’m considering trying to drag them if that’s not a terrible undertaking. The top rock could be taken out, the rest can’t.

You selling any?

 

[John3]

I was gonna try to sell local, not sure if there is enough of a market for these if you gotta pay shipping. Plus I’m not really setup to ship.

 

[phil bevilacqua]

Ok man. Keep me in mind

 

[Mike1995]

I was gonna try to sell local, not sure if there is enough of a market for these if you gotta pay shipping. Plus I’m not really setup to ship.

I saw you're in Pennsylvania. I am as well. What part are you from? If you're not terribly far would you be willing to sell me a few frags?

 

[ColorReef]

wow, zoa goals! How did you get these to go gangbusters on you? I bought a single sunny d polyp for 5 bucks 3 months ago and its only grown one more head since then lol.

 

[roninmagik1]

why don't you just sell the rock with the zoas on them, and then you'll probably have money enough to buy new live rock, and even some profit?

 

[John3]

I have really good luck with zoa growth. I don’t think I do anything special. I have noticed the polyp size I get is very big compared to most. There would probably be twice as many sunny Ds if they had room to grow. Once you get to 8-10 heads their growth goes nuts.

I think my tank really took off when I got an ato. I just manually dose 2 part. I’ve tried some additives in the past but never saw much difference. I do a 20% water change with reef crystals every 2 weeks.

 

[John3]

why don't you just sell the rock with the zoas on them, and then you'll probably have money enough to buy new live rock, and even some profit?

I thought about it but it’s Tampa live rock and I don’t want to replace it with lfs rock and I certainly don’t want to mess with the tanks balance at this point. The undersides of my rock are covered with sponges and all kinds of beneficial life.

 

[Coralreefer1]

Yeah I didn’t expect these to spread this fast. The sunny Ds for example went from 2 heads to probably 250ish in less than a year. They have kinda stalled out on new heads since they don’t really have anywhere to go now.

I guess my biggest mistake was put so many dead center on my rock work.

I had the same problem where they would populate to the extent that they ran out of real estate with which to grow any more. So I cut off a couple polyps and affixed them to another vacant spot and within a week or so what were two polyps are now five. These were my Pandora Palythoas, plus they are almost twice the size now!

 

[Coralreefer1]

I thought about it but it’s Tampa live rock and I don’t want to replace it with lfs rock and I certainly don’t want to mess with the tanks balance at this point. The undersides of my rock are covered with sponges and all kinds of beneficial life.

I had the same dilemma so what I did was bring the rock to my local pet shop. He cut the Zoanthids off with the saw and gave me back the rock because mine also had sponge and feather dusters on it. Plus I got new corals with the Zoanthids he cut off.

 

[uutank]

wow, zoa goals! How did you get these to go gangbusters on you? I bought a single sunny d polyp for 5 bucks 3 months ago and its only grown one more head since then lol.

I feel you bro lol

 

[Coralreefer1]

Growing Zoanthids and Palythoas is a trial and error process. You have to monitor them and determine if they are happy or deficient in something causing limited, slow or no growth, full polyp extension or not, and color depiction.

Let me explain, I have numerous types of Zoanthids and Palythoas. Often times I have had to move various ones because the flow wasn’t strong enough or light was not quite right. Then, playing with water parameters and different foods to bring out the best in my Zoanthids and Palythoas.

A couple things that really stand out are light intensity and color(kelvin) really changes the color and growth rate of many Zoanthid and Palythoa types. They will expel one strain of zooxanthellae and replace it with another form which changes the color or pattern of a particular one. Case and point, I have a colony of Utter Chaos Palythoas. Some of them have developed more orange and less pink mixed in. I also have a Whoville polyp that I thought was dying. It opened up a couple days later and looks almost like a different type of Paly all together.
If I don’t run strictly blue lights like they do at pet shops, many of my frags grow very fast. I’m talking like one to two polyps every week or two.
Like with any coral species, you need to do change things slowly and acclimate them to light intensity fluctuations.
Of course, some types of Zoanthids and Palythoas do better than others. Some grow faster than others while others have a better chance of melting than withstanding your tanks parameters.

 

[sunnycadreamer]

I am in so much love with your tank. What size is it? What lights are you using? What light schedule? What powerheads do you have and how many? Did you ever figure out how to prune your Zoas? I just picked up 4 colors of zoas and want to make sure I do it right. What are your typical parameters? Can you also tell me what else you have in there? I think I know the names of a lot of it but, I've been out of the hobby so long I've forgotten a lot of the knowledge I used to have.

 

[Reef GE]

Is pruning Zoas "dangerous?" I've read about palytoxins but don't have firsthand knowledge about them.