Fragging

kevin34

Active Member
I am soooo confused about the fragging process. I know that it is when you cut a coral to make it smaller but how do you do this and still have pieces that live and grow? Can anyone provide a step-by-step fragging process? Before and after pics would also help a lot if you have any.
 

scsinet

Active Member
Fragging is more often used to propogate corals than to "prune" them, but regardess, corals regenerate.
I had a finger leather once that was really neat... but I had something that was eating him (cant' remember what). Anyway it chewed him into about 8 pieces. I stuck each chunk onto a rock and now I have 8 really neat finger leathers.
Can you be more specific as to what kind of coral you are looking to frag? There are different methods for different stuff.
 

kevin34

Active Member
I dont have a tank setup yet (just trying to get all my info ahead of time), but I was planning on getting zoos, mushrooms, bubble coral, toadstool, yellow figi, devil's hand, and probably several other leathers.
 

scsinet

Active Member
Well leathers are pretty easy... just slice them with a new razor blade and rubber band them to a rock.
 

kevin34

Active Member
Originally Posted by SCSInet
Well leathers are pretty easy... just slice them with a new razor blade and rubber band them to a rock.
Does it matter where you cut them? It you cut them anywhere will the smaller pieces eventually reattach to the rock and grow into the same shape as they were before? Also do zoos, mushrooms, and bubble coral ever need to be fragged?
 

scsinet

Active Member
Generally you want to leave polyps in place on both resulting pieces.
For example, you can't just hack down a Colt Coral at the base and expect the stump to grow into a new one... but if you cut a branch off at the main stalk, you should be fine.
Yes, the fragged pieces will eventually grow into a full sized coral.
A bubble coral is an LPS (Large Polyp Stony). It is seriously harmful to the coral to attempt to frag it as it leaves a gaping hole that can get infected. It and other LPS like plates, tounges, fungia, brains, etc are best left in one piece. LPS's that branch, like branching frogspawn, candy cane, etc are all easiy fragged, but that's because you can easily break off entire whole polyps.
Never try to divide a single polyp.
Zoos and mushrooms ... keep in mind, nothing NEEDS to be fragged unless it is overgrowing, etc. Really though these are just bunches of individual corals (polyps in this case) living together in a colony. Fragging them is more or less tearing off one polyp and attaching it somewhere else.
 

sjgsm

Member
With leathers you cut off a piece of the head (where the polyps are),mushrooms and zoo's dont really need to be fragged as they spread often, you can just put loose rocks next to them and that should be the easy non surgical way of fragging. But I believe with mushrooms you can also just cut down the middle and get a piece of the mouth much like a starfish. To that I'm not positive but someone will correct me if I'm wrong. As far as the overall fragging, it is rather easy if you dont have a light stomach.
LOL SCSI posted before me and hit the nail on the head
 

kevin34

Active Member
Thanks for all the help. So as long as I dont cut through the main base of the coral and through a polyp I should be fine? And what is the gross part about fragging? Sight? Smell?
 

scsinet

Active Member
Originally Posted by Kevin34
Thanks for all the help. So as long as I dont cut through the main base of the coral and through a polyp I should be fine? And what is the gross part about fragging? Sight? Smell?
Remember the first 10 minutes of saving private ryan?
No seriously... cutting living things apart like that can be unnerving for some.
There is a smell... that "coraly" smell, and it's kinda slimy, but it's not so bad.
 
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