Zoa's Spreading

[moncapitane]

What is the best way to tell if your Zoa's are fixing to split/multiply? I have had a few of them for almost a month and I haven't seen much of a change if any at all. I do about 10% water change once a week, ~5 gallons on 55 gallon tank and my parameters are very good.

 

[Cheeser]

Just give it time. Some spread faster than others. How are they looking? Healthy? Do u feed them? I reccomend feeding them reef chilli or roti-feast about twice a week. Take pics every month and compare the photos. It might take them a month just to really get used to ur tank and where u put them but it might take a month or 2 after for u to really see them spreading. Also I believe a vitamin c supplement will help em grow as well.

 

[moncapitane]

The color seems the same as what it looks like in the pictures. They seem healthy and I do see some growth on how long their base tubs are. I am not feeding at this time. I have about 8 or 9 hours of around 50-60% power on my LEDs. I am by no means in a hurry, just curious about how long it takes since people talk about their Zoas spreading like weeds.

My other concern is about leaving them on the frag plugs. I kinda have the plugs down in the holes of my rocks but I'm curious about how they are going to spread onto my rocks. I will take some pictures when I get home to feed my fishys here in an hour or so.

 

[Treezer8]

They will eventually grow to the sides of the plug, or just multiply and when they need more room, they have the rock. I have some zoas spread like crazy but take forever to grow off the plugs. Others will just go right to the sides of the plug and onto the rock.

Give it time, you can target feed them if you want, and try not to move the plug that they're on. The zoas in my tank that grew onto the rocks first were the ones that I find a tight spot for, and never messed with.

 

[moncapitane]

Yea, I haven't moved the plugs lately. I just have them where they are good and have been leaving them there. They seems to be doing well. They close up after I turn off the lights and open up when I turn the lights on. I'm assuming they are doing well.

 

[RockStacker]

Smaller zoa colonies will spread relatively slower because there are not a lot of "mom" polyps to begin with. Btw, all the polyps are potential "mom" polyps.
But as the colony grows, it could get exponential under ideal conditions.

The most obvious sign is that the mantle or mat under the colony would spread out at the base and then baby polyps would grow from that mat.
Some zoas spread their mats evenly around the colony while some extend the mats in strips like grass runners.

 

[reefnoob]

So not all polyps can reproduce? Does that mean there is a possibility of getting a frag with 1 polyp that cannot reproduce so that it will forever be only 1 polyp?

 

[Cheeser]

im sure that if u get a 1 polyp frag it will still spread. it might seem to take longer just cuz its 1 polyp multiplying rather than3 or 4 at the same time. they tend to spread faster with at least 3-5 polyps rather than 1.

 

[Treezer8]

So not all polyps can reproduce? Does that mean there is a possibility of getting a frag with 1 polyp that cannot reproduce so that it will forever be only 1 polyp?

They can all reproduce.

If you have a small frag disk with 1 zoa on it, eventually you will see another head branch out from the base, then another, then another, then multiple at the same time.
If you have small frag disk with like 7 or 8 zoas already attached, you can expect growth at a much faster rate

 

[moncapitane]

I believe a few of mine have now offically spawned since opening this thread. One of the frags now has addition slick spots on the frags like where a new polyp is going to show up soon. I guess I'm just not patient. lol

 

[sen5241b]

What is the best way to tell if your Zoa's are fixing to split/multiply? I have had a few of them for almost a month and I haven't seen much of a change if any at all. I do about 10% water change once a week, ~5 gallons on 55 gallon tank and my parameters are very good.

My zoas are spreading. You need three things to make that happen:

1. Lighting. Zoas need strong light BUT there is a such thing as too much light. There are deep water zoas (the blues) that must have lower light requirements and shallow water zoas like reds and greens that can take higher intensity light. I once put some zoas with 5 or 6 inches of a 150W MH and they melted.
   
2. Water quality. Like most other corals they need excellent water. Test yoru waters parms.
   
3. Patience. Corals grow slowly.

BTW, you know zoas are highly poisonous? Right?

 

[tonyg]

My zoas seemed to take forever to get going, i started with 2 different types on small chunks of live rock, just a couple of poloyps each. I noticed little "runners" start to spread out from the bottom which soon sprouted poloyps. Once their numbers increased they started spreading like wildfire. They have covered almost the entire rock they are on wich is over 6 x 6 in less than a year.

 

[Bifferwine]

My zoas seemed to take forever to get going, i started with 2 different types on small chunks of live rock, just a couple of poloyps each. I noticed little "runners" start to spread out from the bottom which soon sprouted poloyps. Once their numbers increased they started spreading like wildfire. They have covered almost the entire rock they are on wich is over 6 x 6 in less than a year.

That's because they grow exponentially. If you start with one zoa, it has to spread, then each of the babies has to spread. So growth is slow. If you start with several of them, they all spread and growth is faster.