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Propogating Corals
by Jim McNulty

Somebody Salt Me
June 1999 newsletter - The Tropical Fish Society of R.I.

Hey Fishheads,

I thought that this month I would devote my column to one of the other projects that I do for the club. Library night to be specific. The third Saturday of each month, a few of us get together for open discussion on anything that is fish related. We began this practice approximately 6 months ago. Since that time, it has evolved into more of a hands on workshop type of evening. Most of the time, it has been myself and Larry, our Tankquilizer editor. Other members have come as well. Because the group is small, everyone can participate and actually get their hands wet. The first couple of times we really had no direction. We just sat around in the fish room flipping through the books and talking about anything interesting that we came across. (The TFSRI has approximately 200 books and periodicals) As time went on, we realized that we needed more structure for the evening. We decided to choose an interesting project each month to do. I thought I would relate the events of one particulate evening here so that other members have an idea of what it's all about.

As most of you know, the last couple of years I have drifted away from my freshwater roots and began keeping marine animals. Oddly enough, fish are not where my interest lies in the ocean. Invertebrates are what float my boat. Shrimps, crabs, corals, anemones and yes even algae offer a seemingly endless supply of enjoyment. Now that I have enjoyed some success in keeping them alive, I thought we could try our hand at propagating them. So that's what we did. Of course you don't just grab a knife and start cutting into them. First you need to research the particular species that you have and learn the different ways that it reproduces. Not all coral can be propagated by cuttings. Fortunately, the variety we chose to attempt is a branching type that does respond to this type of procedure. While attending the NEC Weekend Workshop this year, I was able to meet and hang out with two nationally renowned experts in this field. Larry Jackson and Scott Michael are both well known in the marine circles and were more than happy to prepare me for my initial attempt at coral propagation.

The target animal was of the genera Gorgonian. Although I am unsure of the particular species I have, it's actually irrelevant because they all grow and reproduce in the same manner in that genes. When I purchased my specimen approximately 1 year ago from Aqualife Aquarium owned and operated by club member George Goulart, it had 4 branches and was about 6 inches tall. It has grown to and amazing 11 inches and now has 12 branches. The animal has thrived in my tank and seemed to be a perfect candidate for the library night experiment. Although I prefer this to be a technical paper, I'm going to use laymen terms and comparisons to the human arm so you can attempt to visualize and better understand what it is that I am describing.

First and foremost, it's important to remember that corals are animals and not plants. They grow and reproduce just like terrestrial vertebrates but lack things such as eyes, brain, legs and other structures that we typically associate with animals. The coral in question has 4 basic structures. The inner most is thin like a piece of wire. This functions like a bone and gives the animal rigidity. Moving outward, the next structure is a white porous material reminiscent of a sponge. This is like the muscle in a human arm. It gives the coral some meat on it's bones if you will. Next is a layer of Horny Tissue. This is the outer layer and acts like the skin. It protects the structures beneath it. The last part of the animal are it's feeding polyps. These have the ability to retract when the animal is threatened. They are used for capturing small bits of food. When a polyp does catch a morsel, it can retract independently from the rest of the polyps. Because there is no central transport system such as a digestive or circulatory system, the entire animal is covered with thers polyps and I believe they nourish the areas in close proximity to them. When fully open, it resembles a hairy branch. Gorgonians are ahermatypic corals meaning they are non-reef building soft corals. They do not have the coveted symbiotic relationship with zooxanthellae algae. This leaves them to fend for themselves for food and nourishment.

The procedure began by tapping on the animal with my finger on the branch to be cut. This caused the polyps to close so that the branch looked like a pink pencil eraser. Next, we used a regular pair of scissors to snip about a 4 inch piece off of the mother animal. The specimen was then removed from the water to a damp paper towel. We took an exacto knife and cut into the horney tissue about an inch up from the bottom. At first, I wasn't sure how deep to cut to get to the bone that was described to me. I had never seen the inside of any coral up till then. At first we thought that the sponge like structure was the bone but I continued to cut deeper in the name of science. Then, way down in the middle was the bone. It was about half the size of the diameter of a coat hanger wire. We cut all the surrounding tissue away so that the whole inch of bone was now exposed. 20 or so polyps were destroyed that lived on that inch if sacrificed tissue. Now that we could see the diameter size of the bone, we looked around for a piece of rock sporting a hole about that size. Here is where I made a mistake. My reef gurus had said to stick some epoxy in the hole and to only cement the bone structure in the hole. Well, I had found a hole that the full diameter of the eraser like structure slid right into. I'm not really sure why I deviated from my prescribed technique. I guess I was looking ahead to the future and I liked the way it looked on the bigger rock.

The next morning, upon close examination, I saw that all of the polyps had fully opened. I also observed that the cutting had lost it's rigidity and was now leaning all the way over so that the tip was touching the substrate. Other than that, the animal seemed no worse for all it had been through the night before. We performed this particular procedure at the March Library Night. Now here we are in June and I am pleased to announce that the animal is still alive and continues to open fully each day. On the down side, because I did not properly place my cutting in the proper manor, the bottom part touching the rock has rotted away. Not to worry though. As I mentioned earlier, the polyps seem to live independently of each other. I plan to now re-cut the bottom and affix it properly. Even with my small mistake, I feel the experiment was a success. I think it is also interesting to point out that while the end result did produce two separate animals, this type of procedure does not constitute having bred the coral. The new animal is really a clone of the original animal. Either way the end result is the same. I had one animal and now I have two!! YEAH!!!

We have been talking about what we could do at future installments of Library night. Some of the tentative plans are to compare the efficiency and ease of installation of two different protein skimmers. Create three control groups of Aptasia anemones and inject them with several types of eradication formulas I have. The latest idea was to take a small refrigerator and convert it into an aquarium chillier. We also discuss and work hands on with fresh water applications. Don't think that the event is just for salt water. If your interested in attending a Library night, they fall on the Saturday evening after our general meeting. That's the third Saturday each month. We usually start around 7:30 and go till 1:00 or so. Anyone is welcome to attend. In closing, I would like to thank several people for their recent Library donations. Thanks to Rick Diaz for the donation of a beautiful hard cover book titled "Adventures with Discus." Rick is a new member having joined in April And a hell of a nice guy I might add. Welcome to the club. Also, we had a donation from the director of facilities at Logan international airport. Jim Powers gave us two books. Oscars by Neil Pronek and Exotic Aquarium Fishes by Innes. Jim is not a member but supports what we stand for. Thank you for thinking of us here in Rhode Island. Well, that's it for this installment of "Somebody Salt Me" Please join me again next month.

Jim Mcnulty