Wild Caught Aussie Acro Question

[PsyWAR.Reefing]

QUESTION: What is the trick to acclimating wild caught acros?

I’ve recently had the opportunity to acquire a few Frags of Aussie wild caught acros. The first 2 Frags lived for about a month then within days bleached and died. At one point they both had polyp extension and looked really good. Then they lost color, shed their skin, and died within days. I started them out low in the tank and gradually tried to bring it up but to no avail. I have other aqua-cultured acros in the tank that are perfect. They have polyp extension and everything.

Alk-8.7
cal-470 (maybe a little high)
mag-1350
salinity-1.024
nitrate phosphate-0 (maybe too low)
ph-8.2

TIA

P.S. this is one of my non-wild caught acros:

 

[scuzy]

Could there be other factors? I lost a few colonies of Aussie across but turns out I had chloramine in my water. Maybe they are not used to it compare to aquacultured?

 

[jda]

Daylight. Wait to dip them. Wild are different than AQ or Mari... they are not yet weeded out to be suitable to certain kinds of tank life.

Remember that they just came out of the ocean and collected while wading in water or using one-breath... these are going to have come from a 6500k spectrum. I use 6500k metal halide when I get in wild stuff.

I do not dip them until their color gets better and they start to grow and heal a bit. I will dip them if I see pests.

Some are going to die. If you find somebody that never loses a wild piece, then they need to be the keynote and every other speaker slot at the next MACNA since they are for real. Some will never look good under less output and bluer spectrum... some will get better under less output and bluer spectrum... most kinda stay the same just with brighter higher contrast colors under more light and richer/duller colors under less. You almost have to order a whole bunch and hope that a few turn out OK. Since some die and most are just OK, this is why people want to recoup their costs of doing business when they hit on a gem.

 

[PsyWAR.Reefing]

Could there be other factors? I lost a few colonies of Aussie across but turns out I had chloramine in my water. Maybe they are not used to it compare to aquacultured?

I use RO/DI water. I’m not sure if I have chloramine.

 

[PsyWAR.Reefing]

Daylight. Wait to dip them. Wild are different than AQ or Mari... they are not yet weeded out to be suitable to certain kinds of tank life.

Remember that they just came out of the ocean and collected while wading in water or using one-breath... these are going to have come from a 6500k spectrum. I use 6500k metal halide when I get in wild stuff.

I do not dip them until their color gets better and they start to grow and heal a bit. I will dip them if I see pests.

Some are going to die. If you find somebody that never loses a wild piece, then they need to be the keynote and every other speaker slot at the next MACNA since they are for real. Some will never look good under less output and bluer spectrum... some will get better under less output and bluer spectrum... most kinda stay the same just with brighter higher contrast colors under more light and richer/duller colors under less. You almost have to order a whole bunch and hope that a few turn out OK. Since some die and most are just OK, this is why people want to recoup their costs of doing business when they hit on a gem.

So acclimate with white instead of blues? I use SB reef lights LEDs

 

[jda]

I don't know. Sorry. Some people land wild acros OK with LEDs, but most struggle and take a while to get them moved over. Lower output might be best.

Some white LED is not good for acropora at all and can burn them... some are better.

 

[Gregg @ ADP]

I don't know. Sorry. Some people land wild acros OK with LEDs, but most struggle and take a while to get them moved over. Lower output might be best.

Some white LED is not good for acropora at all and can burn them... some are better.

I do pretty well with wild acros without doing much of anything special to them.

Then again, I came up doing this when all acros (and pretty much everything else) were
wild.

Quick story that I won’t go into too deeply because some people on the board would probably just as soon forget about it. There was a big tank that is no longer with us that received it’s first SPS (mainly wild Acros) a month after it was installed. They were really big, and there were a LOT of them. Straight out of the bags and into the tank, under a blazing array of 10k halides and t5s. No acclimation, no dipping, no coddling. Just out of the bag and into the tank.

Hardly lost any at all (maybe 5-6%). Color stayed great and new growth started quickly. I wasn’t scared of just dumping a bunch of huge wild Acros into a brand new tank because...well, I didn’t have the option.

 

[Punchanello]

I'm in Australia. I have a much higher success rate with wild caught colonies than I do with frags. Obviously these colonies are subject to much shorter travel time and less handling than those heading overseas.

Whatever the trick is, it's about helping them recover from shipping rather than any special treatment because they are wild colonies. I literally dip them, and glue them straight to the spot I want them. I don't even generally light, temp or water acclimate them. In fact, when they have died or begun to look stressed it has been when I have faffed around moving, acclimating and adjusting. They seem to do better plonked in a spot and left to adjust without interference. I have had only one that hasn't survived of over 20.

I will say that I use a t5/LED hybrid with the LED used really minimally only to 'please the eye'. In my limited experience I am coming to the belief that the 'softness' and the diffusion of the T5 may be a factor in survival. The point of light LED factor is the only one that stands out in my mind as being the most significantly different from the colony's wild experience.

 

[mtraylor]

Dip and Stick. Then pray. Same practice on frags. LOL. Thats about it. If your parms are stable that is the key. No alk swings etc.

 

[markalot]

I have bought four wild caughts in my short reefing history. One was a horrida, it struggled for months and months and then exploded with growth. One was an unknown, it colored up fairly well, very unique looking, and then dead, RTN overnight. Another came in yellowish and greenish. It had some pests on it but I scraped and fragged and somehow avoided AEFW, though I did get red bugs. It colored up a beautiful pink and white and that lasted for a few months, then it died.

The fourth browned, looked like it was going to die, then turned a nice thick healthy brown with some polyp extension and started to grow rapidly. It's still brown. I moved it to the sump, half of it died, the other half grew, got some bluish tips under a cheap LED light. Still mostly brown. I've just moved a frag of it back to the main display. I expect more brown. I've had it for almost 2 years now and it survived some very rough times. Who knows, maybe next year it will finally color up?

This is the brown one once growth started. It tripled in size over a couple of months.

This is the wild horrida, still alive, still happy, and the strangest acro in my tank. Very fun.

Suffice to say, they can be fun, stressful, full of pests, or just plain dead. And this is just in my limited experience.

 

[mtraylor]

That pink was gorgeous

 

[DesertReefT4r]

Couple of wild Aussie frags I just got from the LFS. They hold larger colonies for a few months, get them healthy and happy in an aquarium environment, then make several frags to sell, keep a frag to grow out and sell the rest of the larger original colony. All under G4 Pros as well and I have seen several of these wild colonies doing very well. My tank is lit with only 250w Phoenk 14k. Wilds have been hit and miss for me in the past but I used to get them fresh from a LFS right after delivery, more miss than hit I still have several dead skeletons to prove it. Time will tell how these do under my care.

 

[Graffiti Spot]

I find more coral pests in local tanks than I do in boxes of wild corals when I get them.
I don't have experience with led and wild stuff but Cairns marine keeps all their wild acros under just leds. I would bet they have the fixtures higher up and do use the white channels to some extent.

 

[marlinmon]

I don't know. Sorry. Some people land wild acros OK with LEDs, but most struggle and take a while to get them moved over. Lower output might be best.

Some white LED is not good for acropora at all and can burn them... some are better.

I’ve got a colony (fist size) that I blast with LEDs (600 PAR) and it’s looking great. Just one data point though

 

[mtraylor]

Couple of wild Aussie frags I just got from the LFS. They hold larger colonies for a few months, get them healthy and happy in an aquarium environment, then make several frags to sell, keep a frag to grow out and sell the rest of the larger original colony. All under G4 Pros as well and I have seen several of these wild colonies doing very well. My tank is lit with only 250w Phoenk 14k. Wilds have been hit and miss for me in the past but I used to get them fresh from a LFS right after delivery, more miss than hit I still have several dead skeletons to prove it. Time will tell how these do under my care.

To have better success. Its best to put them where you want them from the beginning. They look great!

 

[mtraylor]

I find more coral pests in local tanks than I do in boxes of wild corals when I get them.
I don't have experience with led and wild stuff but Cairns marine keeps all their wild acros under just leds. I would bet they have the fixtures higher up and do use the white channels to some extent.

Water chemistry and flow is the key. If you can get the coral somewhere where it likes it immediately. Its will be happy. I always dip my corals so I dont worry much about the pests.
LPS are usually loaded more with pests than sps.

 

[markalot]

That pink was gorgeous

Yea, I can't have nice things. I had a well growing frag of the same coral on a frag rack that died at the exact same time in the exact same way. It had to be a water quality or stability issue but I'm still not sure what it was.

 

[mtraylor]

Yea, I can't have nice things. I had a well growing frag of the same coral on a frag rack that died at the exact same time in the exact same way. It had to be a water quality or stability issue but I'm still not sure what it was.

LOL. I know what you mean. Been there done that. It always happens that way. Even up to today. Not sure how my fish know how much I paid for a coral, but they do. Only bother the expensive ones. LOL.

 

[mtraylor]

When I started reefing that was pretty much all you got was wild caught. So it was learning via hard knocks. That is why I get them both now, but I"m selective. Nothing too big. I had one coral form this slummy ball around the corals and I didn't know what it was. By the time the bubble popped in about 2 days, the coral was STN'd below it and the fragments from the bubble went around the tank touching my other corals. Everyone it touched, it RTN'd. Only Monti's were impervious to that thing. ;Brb

 

[Sea MunnKey]

I find that Aussie sps are very hardy and most of mine are wild and I never dip any of them at all.