where to mount chalice, favia, and acan frag?

canadianeh

Valuable Member
View Badges
Joined
Feb 28, 2017
Messages
1,611
Reaction score
1,044
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
I have my frag on sandbed right now. If you mount them on a big piece of life rock, how do you frag them without tearing down your aquascape? If you don't frag them, will they stop growing when they run out of space?

How about chalice? do you need to mount them on the edge of an overhang so they can grow out and form a shape of a cup/chalice? Will it also grow inward toward the rest of the rock?
 

Flippers4pups

Fins up since 1993
View Badges
Joined
Jun 21, 2016
Messages
18,499
Reaction score
60,635
Location
Lake Saint Louis, Mo
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
Acans aren’t much of a issue as they grow fairly slow. Favia’s kind of in the same boat, but they can take up some space in time. The chalice can plate in any direction and if mounted at the edge of rock work, will grow on the rock as much as it can.

Location is key and expect them to colonize any real estate they can take.
 

nano_ryan

Active Member
View Badges
Joined
Feb 29, 2020
Messages
363
Reaction score
225
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
Got to remember “ par “, and how it is the key to knowing where the coral will grow best. Acans is in the family of lps corals, and need a par of 50-150. I think favia is also lps. Chalice is considered sps and should be located in higher ranges of par areas in your tank(200-500par). Finding par requires a par meter, which is a very expensive piece of equipment. You can rent one for seven days from BRS for about 70$. Your lighting spectrum and intensity will determine par. Remember the higher the frag, means higher the par. BRStv has many videos on this topic, if you need some guidance.
 
OP
OP
canadianeh

canadianeh

Valuable Member
View Badges
Joined
Feb 28, 2017
Messages
1,611
Reaction score
1,044
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
Got to remember “ par “, and how it is the key to knowing where the coral will grow best. Acans is in the family of lps corals, and need a par of 50-150. I think favia is also lps. Chalice is considered sps and should be located in higher ranges of par areas in your tank(200-500par). Finding par requires a par meter, which is a very expensive piece of equipment. You can rent one for seven days from BRS for about 70$. Your lighting spectrum and intensity will determine par. Remember the higher the frag, means higher the par. BRStv has many videos on this topic, if you need some guidance.
I am not worried about the PAR yet. I am just worried about the other things that I asked on my first post. Also, chalice is apparently LPS and not SPS.
 

Tired

2500 Club Member
View Badges
Joined
Aug 29, 2020
Messages
4,016
Reaction score
4,104
Location
Central Texas
Rating - 100%
1   0   0
"Away from each other", mostly. Chalices and favias sting other corals, badly. Nasty sweepers. Acan lords don't sting, acan echinatas are aggressive stingers, so you should figure out which you have.

People frag corals in the tank. Just reach in there with some cutters. Works best with things you can actually get with cutters- stony corals that form a big sort of lump situation, like acans, do typically need to be removed from the tank to frag. Though some people can get around that.

LPS and SPS aren't scientific definitions, they're general terms used to say whether something has relatively large or small polyps. Some corals are referred to by both terms.

PAR is very relevant to where to mount your corals. Otherwise you can harm and eventually kill them.
 

techdef

Active Member
View Badges
Joined
May 28, 2020
Messages
161
Reaction score
140
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
F4C29DB6-D892-4AEA-B7B5-CEE11126DCF1.jpeg
A Happy chalice will spread like wildfire. Mount it low and away from acan. They like to get started in the darker areas. Take a look and see what you have. Most are encrusting - like this one above. A few, cyphastrea decadia, are branching. As encrusting, they’ll take the shape of what they grow on, not form a cup shape like montipora will. If I had to guess on the ‘chalice’ it would be shape of the big polyps?
 
OP
OP
canadianeh

canadianeh

Valuable Member
View Badges
Joined
Feb 28, 2017
Messages
1,611
Reaction score
1,044
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
"Away from each other", mostly. Chalices and favias sting other corals, badly. Nasty sweepers. Acan lords don't sting, acan echinatas are aggressive stingers, so you should figure out which you have.

People frag corals in the tank. Just reach in there with some cutters. Works best with things you can actually get with cutters- stony corals that form a big sort of lump situation, like acans, do typically need to be removed from the tank to frag. Though some people can get around that.

LPS and SPS aren't scientific definitions, they're general terms used to say whether something has relatively large or small polyps. Some corals are referred to by both terms.

PAR is very relevant to where to mount your corals. Otherwise you can harm and eventually kill them.
What I mean is I care for PAR, but right now I am asking about the other things I mentioned on the first post.
 
OP
OP
canadianeh

canadianeh

Valuable Member
View Badges
Joined
Feb 28, 2017
Messages
1,611
Reaction score
1,044
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
F4C29DB6-D892-4AEA-B7B5-CEE11126DCF1.jpeg
A Happy chalice will spread like wildfire. Mount it low and away from acan. They like to get started in the darker areas. Take a look and see what you have. Most are encrusting - like this one above. A few, cyphastrea decadia, are branching. As encrusting, they’ll take the shape of what they grow on, not form a cup shape like montipora will. If I had to guess on the ‘chalice’ it would be shape of the big polyps?
According to some corals farmers like Tidal garden, some of them do form like a cup.

 

techdef

Active Member
View Badges
Joined
May 28, 2020
Messages
161
Reaction score
140
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
According to some corals farmers like Tidal garden, some of them do form like a cup.

Welp, cool! Learn something every day in this hobby. Closest I’ve seen to that is my “salad bowl”
9644480C-47EA-4B2A-8F95-6E9BDD7C008B.jpeg
 

intricate_reefer

Valuable Member
View Badges
Joined
Aug 12, 2011
Messages
1,099
Reaction score
1,924
Location
New Bern, NC
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
Got to remember “ par “, and how it is the key to knowing where the coral will grow best. Acans is in the family of lps corals, and need a par of 50-150. I think favia is also lps. Chalice is considered sps and should be located in higher ranges of par areas in your tank(200-500par). Finding par requires a par meter, which is a very expensive piece of equipment. You can rent one for seven days from BRS for about 70$. Your lighting spectrum and intensity will determine par. Remember the higher the frag, means higher the par. BRStv has many videos on this topic, if you need some guidance.
Chalice are considered a LPS not sps. They generally like lower lighting. I would shoot for 75-100. Throwing one into 200-500 par with out aclimating it slowly will likely beach it. Once they get bleached it is very hard to get them to recover even after moving them to lower light.
 

Billldg

My Gem Tang Is Watching You
View Badges
Joined
May 14, 2018
Messages
17,478
Reaction score
121,885
Location
Georgia
Rating - 0%
0   0   0
Acans have a tendency to grow on anything possible, so if you plan on fragging them then I would suggest putting them on a rock of their own so you can pull out the individual rock. Chalice coral have 2 types. Some will just grow outwards and you can just cut them while others encrust, so the same will go as acans for them.

For chalice frags, I usually mount them on a 3in disk and place them on the sand bed and let them grow out. Whether or not you can do this depends on the par of your sand bed.
 
Back
Top