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I've been rather successful in keeping suncorals, they are out all the time and i they have even succesfully spawned leaving babies on nearby rocks. So when i saw a nice yellow speciment today i thought i'd have it. To my surprise, when i was acclimatising the coral (over a 3 hr period, by drip method) i found it had spawned in the bag!! :confused:
hi
how do you get the sun coral to spawn?
ive had a sun coral for about 8 months now, its doing well but it hasnt spread to any other rocks yet :confused:
By Recreating The Lumimar Cycle.
ive just got standard lighting times set up... ie actinics on 7am, halides on 9am, halides off 7pm and actinics off 9pm and my sun corals have spawned... even got one growing in my skimmer! lol makes life difficult when cleaning it out!
to be honest im guessing that as long as theyre happy then they'll spawn... apart from the time i saw them spawn immediately i put them in the tank, ive never seen it again, but obviously they are as got at least 3 new polyps on rocks nowhere near the colony. So just cos youve not seen them doesnt mean they arent :)
To my surprise, when i was acclimatising the coral (over a 3 hr period, by drip method) i found it had spawned in the bag!!
Hi Claude, this sounds intresting an interesting occurence.
When you say its spawned, what is it that you saw?
Oviously if you found larvae or an egg / sperm packet then it definatly spawned. BUT if what you saw was an actual completly seperate polyp, then what i would say has occured is Polyp Bail-out. This is where the polyp leaves the corallite and becomes "free swimming" in search of pastures new. A number of environmental factors can cause bail-out, the main ones are; low oxygen levels within the water, poor water quaility and stress.
Assuming that its a polyp you found;
Seeing as this "spawning" happened during the acclimatation process, and the potential for poorly oxygenated water (within the bag / tub) is high, and that its an oviously stressful time for the coral, I'd say its got to be bail-out.
Do you have a pic of the "offspring".
almost forgot to ask, how big (or small) was the polyp...... out of interest.
Gog
how do you get the sun coral to spawn?
Well, both Hawkawal and Rockaria, kind of hit the nail on the head with there replies to the question, but i add that its species dependent.
As an example; Tubastraea Coccina and Tubastraea Faulkneri are both sold as yellow sun corals or orange sun corals.
In the case of T. Aurea, Hawkawal is spot on with his/her response. With this species, each colony is either male or female and require the phases of the moon to syncronise the release of their respective sperm or eggs.
With T. Coccina, which is asexual, Rockaria is right.
As long as its well fed, "happy" and in good stable water conditions, it will release its egg - sperm packets or planua larvae (free swimming larvae) at any time.
HTH
Gog
sorry to hijack the thread but evilervin do you have any pics of different species to compare?
cheers
jamie
Hi Jamie,
To be honest its almost pointless to post pics to compare, as most of the identifications between Coccinea, Faulkneri is "best guess", with out examining the skeleton of the coral.
Sorry not to be of more help.
Gog
The above posts have been edited, to change Tubastrea Aurea to Faulkneri. I've done this because Faulkneri and Coccinea are by far the most commonly found species in LFS's, sold as *insert colour here* sun coral.
Gog
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