Colt softie out of control

[jvr1102]

My first coral that I ever bought was a medium size colt back in October. Since then it has thrived beyond my belief. My question is can I frag this and maybe sell/give some away just to make some more room in the tank? Any links to help me with this procedure...Thanks.

[Blown 346]

Yes you can frag this, just cut one of the stalks with a very sharp pair of scissors. Try to make the cut clean and fast, and straight across.

[bgkingd340]

was wondering if this can be done with leather corals and a razor blade?

[ACBlinky]

Absolutely. Anything sharp -- knife, razor blade, scissors -- is fine. You can cut through the branches or stalk of a tree-shaped leather and both halves will regenerate. If you're fragging a toadstool you can either cut off a piece, or remove the cap entirely if it's small. I've seen pictures of large sarcs that were fragged by trimming the entire outside edge off like a ring -- it was then sliced into pieces, each of which recovered and grew into an entirely new coral. Cabbage leathers' lobes can be sliced off and will attach to a new substrate within a week or two -- just rubberband them loosely in the meantime.

It's best to remove the coral from the tank if you can; it will produce all sorts of slime when it's fragged that you don't necessarily want in your tank. If that's not possible, you may want to run some carbon after fragging so that other corals aren't irritated.