What is the success rate for most "frags"

GuppyHJD

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I see hundreds of coral frags in several different LFS near me. I have bought maybe a dozen in the past 5 months of my new tank. And then I see many tank photos on R2R full of great looking corals. It makes me wonder - If I buy 10 frags, and my water parameters are in the ranges talked about on this site, how many of these frags should I expect to survive? grow?

I have killed some of my frags with ALK swings (I am guessing) and I lost three of my favorite to a Lemonpeel who ate them. So far I am at 25% are still alive...I am hoping the next dozen do better than the first. I am planning to go more softies and zoas, and less LPS.

One Facebook poster had a lovely tank, only 7 months old, but he said, all of his corals he bought at tennis ball size or bigger....I need to get much better at keeping them alive before I want to invest that much in the coral colonies.
 

ntableman

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For me, the magic bullet, over 20 years of having reef tanks is a calcium reactor and doing slow constant water changes. Once I implemented those...my coral grow so fast I am giving frags away. Each of the colonies, except one, in my tank are about 1.5 to .5 yrs old (this is a new tank) and are the size of plates/bowls/ and larger. I've been amazed how fast they grow after implementing a calcium reactor. I wish I had done it years before.
 

Bouncingsoul39

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depends on several variable and i don’t believe we could make a general statement about the percentage. The key variable is whether or not the coral has been healed fully and is healthy. Next, the size of the coral. Little boogers have poor survival rate. Next is your reef setup. Alk swings don’t kill corals. Maybe Acro only could be harmed but even then if they are very healthy they can live through it.
 

Asonitez

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I've always wondered. When you talk about KH swings are we talking about like - KH dropping slowly over the course of a few days or weeks followed by a week of corrective dosing to bring it up? For instance:


Monday - KH - Starts at 8.3 by Friday KH has dropped to 7.5. So on Friday you dose 50ml of Alk to raise ALK to 8.0 and then on Saturday you dose 20ml of ALK to raise KH to 8.3. -- Is this considered a swing?

In my mind a swing is like Monday KH is 8.3 - Friday KH is 6 and you dose 150ML to raise it back to 8.3 or something. Or like KH is 7 and you dose to bring it to 8.3 in one night. In my mind a swing is a sudden (within 12 hours) change of ALK abruptly. I wouldn't consider necessarily KH dropping from being used up to 7 from 8.3 in 12 hours but I would say don't go ahead and buffer it back to 8.3 so abruptly.
 

PatW

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You need proper flow and lighting.
Stable parameters are the big thing.
An ATO will do for salinity.
There are several ways to keep nutrients in check… water changes or macro algae in a refugium.
Keeping algae under control is a cleanup crew and hand removal.

Some corals are more forgiving than other. Soft corals are reputed to be the easiest.

Ca, Mg and ALK need additions if you have flourishing hard corals. That means dosing either 2/part or reactor. Corals seem to be very sensitive to swings in ALK.

Micronutrients seem to be best maintained by water changes.

For acro frags, putting them on a frag rack in a lower part of the tank for starters seems to help. I mover the rack into brighter light as the frags show growth. Once they get to be mini colonies, they get placed on the rock work.

I also had limited success until I added a series of bacteria mixes. I had ongoing problems with cyano and adding bacteria got rid of it. GHA came in but it is controllable by hand removal.

Marine systems are complex. And corals need a healthy system. And a system has a bunch of moving parts.
 

littlebeard

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If my wife asks, survival rate is 100%.
If another hobbyist asks it's +5% of whatever that other hobbyist just said.
If my brain asks, after finding that rubbermaid container of dried up dead frags that I've been meaning to recycle the frag plugs from, the answer is I don't want to know.


It is hard to calculate. There are easier coral and harder corals, and then we get some that should be in the hard category but seem indestructible. And then those easy corals that seemingly spread like the plague in other tanks but won't survive in mine.


There are a few options:
You can throw tons of money at it, getting the latest gear, tons of frags and hopefully some will survive by pure statistics.
You could also slow down, master the easier corals and slowly progress to the next level.


There is a reason why I drool over those tank of the month pictures. I completely understand the time, money, work and heartache it took to get to that level of reefing.


My advice, don't let those road bumps throw you off the trail. Slow down, enjoy the ride and remember journey before destination.
 

ZoWhat

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For me, the magic bullet, over 20 years of having reef tanks is a calcium reactor and doing slow constant water changes. Once I implemented those...my coral grow so fast I am giving frags away. Each of the colonies, except one, in my tank are about 1.5 to .5 yrs old (this is a new tank) and are the size of plates/bowls/ and larger. I've been amazed how fast they grow after implementing a calcium reactor. I wish I had done it years before.
....but what types of coral do you have?

I have a 95% dominated zoa/paly 6ft 180g DT. If I were to add a Calc Reactor, my uptake of calc/alk is so slow and minimal by my zoas palys thst the reactor would be overkill.

I'd be worried my alk would climb to 13, 14, 16 dKH.

IMO everyone needs to do a DEEP DIVE to discover EXACTLY the uptake of calc, alk, mag is thru testing everyday for 2 weeks and chart the depletion rates
.
 
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GuppyHJD

GuppyHJD

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I've always wondered. When you talk about KH swings are we talking about like - KH dropping slowly over the course of a few days or weeks followed by a week of corrective dosing to bring it up? For instance:


Monday - KH - Starts at 8.3 by Friday KH has dropped to 7.5. So on Friday you dose 50ml of Alk to raise ALK to 8.0 and then on Saturday you dose 20ml of ALK to raise KH to 8.3. -- Is this considered a swing?

In my mind a swing is like Monday KH is 8.3 - Friday KH is 6 and you dose 150ML to raise it back to 8.3 or something. Or like KH is 7 and you dose to bring it to 8.3 in one night. In my mind a swing is a sudden (within 12 hours) change of ALK abruptly. I wouldn't consider necessarily KH dropping from being used up to 7 from 8.3 in 12 hours but I would say don't go ahead and buffer it back to 8.3 so abruptly.
I like the question. I agree with your 150ml dose to raise ALK with a swing of 2.3. I was told no more than 0.4 change in ALK at a time. So if ALK is 6, split that 150ml dose to maybe 20-25ml a day until you get to 8.3? Hopefully more experienced reefers will chime in.
 

Doctorgori

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Oh yeah, Alk swings will kill coral fast. but so will low readings.
Under 6? I'm chancing it and raising it in larger increments a lil faster until the upper 7's
a .3 - .5 bump per week is doable,...eh maybe... but some corals don't even like that
 

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