floating shrooms

[Ronald]

Hi again Anthony, glad you are back.

I am trying to do something with my rapidly spreading Coralomorpharians. My thought was to cut some small plexiglass rectangles, coat them with coral fragments or aragonite sand (using super glue or aquarium sealant as an adhesive) and attach the shrooms to them. This way I could get a nice colony growing on the back wall and or sides of my tank by gluing the plates in place after the shrooms attach. My tank is in the wall style and viewed only from the front. Here's the trouble...

I've tied them, sewed them glued them etc etc and they just keep getting loose. They are in a low flow area with pc lighting plumbed in line with my refugium cascade. Do you think they just don't like the substrate? They actually have lifted out from under the monfilament line I use to secure them. It is getting a little frustrating! Any additional suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

Ron

[reef-man_d-man]

I take a piece of PVC about 1 inch tall and put it in the sand and then put the shroom in there, them once it attaches to the sand, I glue the sand to whatever I want.

[NicoleC]

I had the same experience with rics and mushrooms. Go to the local fabric store and get a yard of bridal veil material, then sew pieces of that to the rock with the shrooms under it.

[Anthony Calfo]

very true... natural settlement is the best for corallimorphs. They really are too mucous to try/use any imposed techniques (tieing, stitching, gluing, etc.).

For loose 'shrooms... I'd keep/use a refugium or settling tray/trough specifically for this purpose. If you want the polyps to attach to a sheet of PVC, plastic, etc... then so be it: lay the tray in the trough and corral/trap them with netting or the like for some days in wait for them to attach. Or for other folks, simply having loose rock/rubble is fine for random settlement.

best regards, Anthony

[Ronald]

Thanks everybody for your suggestions and comments, I will try the trough in the refugium with some plexiglass in it.

The bridal veil has a problem I didn't expect (I have tried it) gas bubbles collect under the veil I presume due to some sort of respiration or metabolic activity on the part of the coral. Then the plexiglass starts to float! I tried putting small holes in the veil to releas the gas, but the little buggers find their way out through the holes! On the plus side, anywhere the mushroom fragments fall they seem to survive and grow, then when they are bigger, I try again to attach them the substrate.

I should say I have had no problem getting them to attach to live rock fragments with veil or thread, only to the sand covered plexiglass. Curious.

Thanks again. Ron:)