Sps Growth Horizontal

Poseidon03 · Sep 27, 2023

Hey everyone, first off, sorry for the bad picture from the side of the colony. The picture is taken from the side of the tank and the acro is in the center of the 8ft tank.

Anyone ever have their acros grow sideways instead of up? Is this due too too high of par? It grows super fast, but I'm not the fondest of the growth pattern from the side. My thought is that it is getting too much light, but I want to see what people who are more experienced think.

Thanks for the help in advanced!

Macdaddynick1 · Sep 27, 2023

Lol it looks like it’s sad. Haha. Do the pumps crash at that point? You can throw some fish food at that spot and see if the flow pushes down on the acro.

Poseidon03 · Sep 27, 2023

Macdaddynick1 said:
Lol it looks like it’s sad. Haha. Do the pumps crash at that point? You can throw some fish food at that spot and see if the flow pushes down on the acro.

Good call. It is definitely crashing right there. I was just messing with the flow yesterday to get rid of some dead spots. Unfortunately, I only have the cheap on off pumps, but I am going to pick up some MP40s today to help increase and randomize the flow. Maybe that would help. I thought about fragging the "sad" parts (going to definitely use that now), but I'd hate to make a coral look smaller when I'm still trying to grow out the tank, lol.

Dburr1014 · Sep 27, 2023

Poseidon03 said:
Good call. It is definitely crashing right there. I was just messing with the flow yesterday to get rid of some dead spots. Unfortunately, I only have the cheap on off pumps, but I am going to pick up some MP40s today to help increase and randomize the flow. Maybe that would help. I thought about fragging the "sad" parts (going to definitely use that now), but I'd hate to make a coral look smaller when I'm still trying to grow out the tank, lol.

I also was thinking flow.
But, if it is, and you fix it(the flow), I think, it would send shoots up and correct it's self. You wouldn't have to snip it... Unless you wanted to.

Macdaddynick1 · Sep 27, 2023

Poseidon03 said:
Good call. It is definitely crashing right there. I was just messing with the flow yesterday to get rid of some dead spots. Unfortunately, I only have the cheap on off pumps, but I am going to pick up some MP40s today to help increase and randomize the flow. Maybe that would help. I thought about fragging the "sad" parts (going to definitely use that now), but I'd hate to make a coral look smaller when I'm still trying to grow out the tank, lol.

The more you cut a healthy coral the better it grows.

Alpha_and_Gec · Sep 27, 2023

Macdaddynick1 said:
The more you cut a healthy coral the better it grows.

How verifiable is this? Sounds like a good method to get a lot of monti shelves really quickly…

Macdaddynick1 · Sep 27, 2023

Alpha_and_Gec said:
How verifiable is this? Sounds like a good method to get a lot of monti shelves really quickly…

Dburr1014 · Sep 28, 2023

Isn't this just common sense?
More growing edges=more growth.
Coral of the same colony of coarse will grow back together, nothing new here.
I don't understand this video. Was he trying to show breaking coral growth news??

Graffiti Spot · Sep 28, 2023

Considering millepora are tabling acropora I don’t think anything is out of the ordinary.

bobnicaragua · Sep 28, 2023

I’ve got a ton of crashing flow, and none of my acros grow downward like that.

My money is on small light modules causing irregular growth patterns. How’s your lighting coverage?

Macdaddynick1 · Sep 28, 2023

Dburr1014 said:
Isn't this just common sense?
More growing edges=more growth.
Coral of the same colony of coarse will grow back together, nothing new here.
I don't understand this video. Was he trying to show breaking coral growth news??

You knew that you could regrow a slow-growing type of coral from micro frags into the size of a 75-year-old specimen, and act like an adult specimen in terms of spawning in just two years and didn't share it with the class?!

What else are you hiding from us?

Poseidon03 · Sep 28, 2023

bobnicaragua said:
I’ve got a ton of crashing flow, and none of my acros grow downward like that.

My money is on small light modules causing irregular growth patterns. How’s your lighting coverage?

My XR30 is literally right on top of that coral, and it was ramped up to 100%, and has been at 100% for 10 months now.

Troylee · Sep 28, 2023

I’d say flow more than lighting is the issue here.. lighting leads to bleaching and stn if it’s too much.. poor spectrum leads to poor growth etc.

exnisstech · Sep 28, 2023

Maybe I'm weird or just a stick newb but I kind of like the growth pattern.

Dburr1014 · Sep 28, 2023

Macdaddynick1 said:
You knew that you could regrow a slow-growing type of coral from micro frags into the size of a 75-year-old specimen, and act like an adult specimen in terms of spawning in just two years and didn't share it with the class?! What else are you hiding from us?

Yes.
People have been placing multiple microfags on the same plug for a pretty long while now to get exponential growth into a mini colony. I'm not sure how long but it's been probably at least 10 years.
I see your video is from 2 years ago that you posted.

A very quick search yielded this result here. And Dana riddle commented on the thread that he's known about it for decades.
Thread 'Fragging SPS = Faster Growth???' https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/fragging-sps-faster-growth.516356/

Here's a paper about it from 2015.

Growing coral larger and faster: micro-colony-fusion as a strategy for accelerating coral cover

Fusion is an important life history strategy for clonal organisms to increase access to shared resources, to compete for space, and to recover from disturbance. For reef building corals, fragmentation and colony fusion are key components of resilience ...

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

Macdaddynick1 · Sep 28, 2023

Dburr1014 said:
Yes.
People have been placing multiple microfags on the same plug for a pretty long while now to get exponential growth into a mini colony. I'm not sure how long but it's been probably at least 10 years.
I see your video is from 2 years ago that you posted.

A very quick search yielded this result here. And Dana riddle commented on the thread that he's known about it for decades.
Thread 'Fragging SPS = Faster Growth???' https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/fragging-sps-faster-growth.516356/

Here's a paper about it from 2015.

Growing coral larger and faster: micro-colony-fusion as a strategy for accelerating coral cover

Fusion is an important life history strategy for clonal organisms to increase access to shared resources, to compete for space, and to recover from disturbance. For reef building corals, fragmentation and colony fusion are key components of resilience ...

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

Lol guess who co-wrote or was quoted in, the paper you posted?

Yanir34 · Sep 29, 2023

I'm also got this growth patterns in my SPS.
I have ATI power module 10×54w and 4 units of MP40 pumps...

SPS2020 · Sep 29, 2023

I think it looks like it's happy and good PE. Personally, I'd leave it alone and let it grow out.

bobnicaragua · Sep 29, 2023

Yanir34 said:
I'm also got this growth patterns in my SPS.
I have ATI power module 10×54w and 4 units of MP40 pumps...

That rules out light coverage.

Poseidon03 · Sep 29, 2023

bobnicaragua said:
That rules out light coverage.

Yeah, my XR30 is blasting mine as can be seen in these pics. I'm also getting good growth from come acros on the bottom of the tank.

@SPS2020

PE is nothing I've had to worry about in this tank, luckily. The growth tip turning downwards in the back is what concerned me. Acros shouldn't grow downward.