Decapitated Frog Spawn

[jkp rules]

So a couple of months ago I set up a 2.5 gallon tank at my office at work. I was looking through my 20 gallon reef setup for some coral anc inverts to drop in when I came across what looked like a head of my frogspawn that had come of the stalk. I figured if I left it in my big tank it would get sucked up in a filter or blow under a rock never be seen again so I picked it up and took it to the tank at work. It's been a few months now and the decapitated head seems to be doing just fine. At night it shrinks to something half the size of a dime and in the day it blows up to the size of a golf ball. Will it continue to grow? Will it start to create a stalk from its base or will it probably just die on me? Any thoughts?

 

[btldreef]

That's really interesting to have a frogspawn do this. My opinion is, if it's lasted a month in a newer tank setup, and seems to be acting normal (shrinking at night), I think you're good. It should grow over time as long as parameters are good and the tank has decent lighting. To get it to grow quicker, you can spot feed, but I don't know if you really want a giant frogspawn in a nano setup.
Do you have a picture of it by any chance?

 

[geoj]

Yep, that happens and if you keep it from getting lost you will see a little white stock, when it gets big glue it to a rock...
Now why did you lose the head? My frogs where in to much flow.

 

[jkp rules]

It happened around when I was trying to change my system and get it off of HOB filters and put in a refugium. It may have been the new flow or or the stress from all that. I'll try and get a picture up later today.

 

[jkp rules]

Hopefully this picture works. It's not weighted down by anything so it tends to float to the back corner of the tank.

 

[btldreef]

Very cool. I had never seen this before. I would definitely try to glue it to something so it doesn't get pushed all over the place.

 

[gemmy]

Neat!

 

[chain]

Yea I would keep it out of direct flow as mentioned above. I broke a head off of one of my colonies with the skeleton still attached and placed into a rock crevice to see how it would fare. It continued to grow beyond control until I needed to add some more coral and decided to remove it. I couldn't lol. I had to remove the rock and was forced to break the small colony apart and discard the remains. A few weeks ago I noticed it regrowing inside the crack lol. Very tiny piece, but none-the-less its getting larger everyday. It's still got a few inches of room to the next coral, but the mother colony is so big now I don't need nor want anymore of it in that tank. +1 to attempting to attach it to something as it heals up.