Fragging Encroaching Protopalythoa's

[plasma800]

Hey eveyone,
Hope this is the right forum for this.

I have some Protopalythoa's that are a piece of rock with some other polyps. I have been warned, and have noticed as well, that the Proto's are seriuosly encrouching and taking over.

Someone suggested that I simply cut the offensive one off at the base and super glue them to antoher bit of rock or rubble that I may have laying around.

http://www.2k911.com/jharper/aqua/zoos.htm

Pictures of this can be found at above link.

Before I tried it, I wanted to get some confirmation about how to go about doing this. Do I literally snip it with some scissors and then literally superglue it down? Does Crazy Glue work, does it all need to be completely dry (rock or proto base). Can I pull the entire rock out of the water for a second while I do it, is it gonna get ****ed at me?

So many questions, so little time....

Thanks so much in advance!

JH

[dcowling]

Most softies in this group release toxins into the water when injured or stressed, so it would be best to remove the colony from the main tank before trying to frag any of it. Someone suggested to me to do a waterchange and then use the old water as a holding tank to do your fragging in.

As some of these toxins are serious enough to affect humans, be sure to protect yourself as well. Wear gloves (elbow length if you can get them) and/or be sure you have no open cuts/scabs or whatever on any surface you'll be putting into the water. I recently had a mild reaction to some true zoanthids that were a little stressed from being shipped, and that really got my attention.

These organisms are less hardy that mushrooms and leathers, so when cutting them, try to get down as close to the rock as possible, even scraping it off if you can. Use the gel type of superglue instead of liquid and you're good to go.

[plasma800]

cool, I have a spare 29 gal and a spare 10 gallon that I can use as a holding tank after fragging.

I'm for sure interested in wearing gloves!! I realize that I need to be careful there.

I already picked up some of the gel glue, so I think I'm going to give this a try monday. I have several poypls that need to be trimmed back, so I'm gonna try to mount them to a few pieces of rubble.

Wish me luck!

Thanks for the advice

[dcowling]

Good luck, and let us know back on this thread how it goes. People are always asking this question, and it would be good to be able to quote this thread with someone's documented personal experience as it happens.