Hammer Coral having Babies?

[edmondspl]

Hey guys just wondering if you guys ever seen a Hammer coral dropping little heads in your aquarium. It is a branching kind and is doing fine. Yesterday I saw it release a couple of little heads. The water parameters are all great. Sorry for the crappy cell phone pic under actinics.

[SVTour]

I've actually never seen this with any of my hammers in the past. The branching ones just split in half (the heads) and extend...never drop pieces.

[PufferNut]

Are those tips from the tentacles? Mine do that only when they get twisted off my the flow. Usually they divide or grow tiny "suckers" on the skeleton.

[edmondspl]

Yeah mine split normally as well but one of the heads looked like it spit these little guys out. No idea why. I've had hammers for years but never seen this before. And it's in a medium flow area.

[cloak]

Check this out.

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2008/8/aafeature1

[psteeleb]

Both my hammer and frogspawn drop heads, so I’m guessing it can be pretty common

The frogspawn heads that break off to repopulate look very different then the normal ones, but I haven't seen a noticeable difference in the hammer break offs

[Caronte]

Are you sure is not a crab or something that is "prunning" your Hammer?

[psteeleb]

Let me elaborate some

Here is a video of a frogspawn in my tank that show 3 distinct head formations:

First there are the normal frogspawn head formation typical of I’d say over 99% of the heads

Second as featured in this video is a ball on a spring, these are to the best of my study and understanding used to clear out competing corals for space. It’s not to say the normal heads do the same but it’s clear to me these have more reach for sweeping and stinging areas now what I’m not sure of is the larger head for capturing current and therefore more movement or does it contain more stingers (maybe both) .

The third type of had is what I commonly see breaking off to repopulate. This head will generally have multiple tips, and again it’s not to say other common heads that break off wont repopulate I just feel with the multiple heads they have more opportunity to colonize faster and thus have a higher survival rate.

<iframe width="853" height="480" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/jDoZSTFnRqc?rel=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>


this video shows another sweeper head on a hammer coral
<iframe width="853" height="480" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/qYUFGfDh5PA?rel=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

And here is a break off from a frogspawn. These are the ones I get breaking off the most often and will usually plant themselves someplace. This one happened to be captured by a tube nem.

<iframe width="853" height="480" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/J6E8F_XP4ag?rel=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

[Aquat]

This happened to me a couple of times too. Except I don't own any hammer corals. Only softies & zoas. Don't remember which coral but I when I was moving the corals. I guess I must of done something that involved physical contact and same thing fell off.

[edmondspl]

Thanks for the replies guys. And those are some cool videos.

[Caronte]

talking about frogspawn grows, let me ask you guys, something that is concerning me:
I epoxy my frogspawn to this rubble rock and I was wondering when he grows, the base will brake the epoxy when the corals start growing? or what it's gonna happens? I do the same thing for my torch and my Hammers.

[psteeleb]

talking about frogspawn grows, let me ask you guys, something that is concerning me:
I epoxy my frogspawn to this rubble rock and I was wondering when he grows, the base will brake the epoxy when the corals start growing? or what it's gonna happens? I do the same thing for my torch and my Hammers.

it's not a problem, at most it may deposit bone structure around or over the epoxy, but for the most part these corals grow outward from the base

[Caronte]

it's not a problem, at most it may deposit bone structure around or over the epoxy, but for the most part these corals grow outward from the base

Cool. Thank You for answer me

[NeilFox]

Check this out.

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2008/8/aafeature1

Nice link. I read the Audobon article when it first came out. This was the predecessor of the notorious Time Magazine article that killed the harvesting industry in the US. Really neat to see the pics of the Hammer Tentacles dropping! I have just noticed my Goni doing the same thing. An individual tentacle? I don't think they will last long but who knows. I would like to see what happens if you have a small tank and let them grow undisturbed.

[Palytoxin718]

Probably got ripped off the colony. I have polyp bail outs but usually had floating tips if I damaged my euphyllia by accident.