Neptune Aquatics

Obtaining unrelated coral colonies for spawning experiment

merickson45

merickson45

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This one might be a little out there, but here goes. I recently set up a coral spawning tank with a reef-pi which mimics the seasonal solar, lunar and temperature changes of an indo-pacific reef. It is currently going through the ugly phase, and in the meantime I'm planning out which corals to stock. In order to have a chance at coral babies in the future, I will need to have two corals of the same species which are unrelated (not from the same mother colony), since identical clones cannot reproduce with each other. This requirement is proving harder to satisfy than I imagined, since most vendors have/provide very little information on the "lineage" of the corals they sell (species, mother colony, etc.). Does anyone have ideas on how to do this? My ideas so far:
  1. Find some connection through a wholesaler/importer to get the info from the growers/divers collecting the coral. Probably tough since I'm not looking to order in bulk.
  2. Find a connection to the importer/divers through a local retailer. I've been around the Bay Area asking at many of the main retailers and so far haven't had much luck with this.
  3. Purchase the same coral from two totally different vendors. This could be risky since exact species identification is very difficult for many corals. Also, from what I understand, there are a small number of wholesalers/importers at the top of the supply chain, meaning that I could still get two frags of the same mother colony from two different retailers. I could lessen the chances of this by buying separately a few weeks apart, but it could still happen if the coral was collected from the same original mother colony at the source.
Anyways, I'm trying to figure this out on the front end so I don't waste my time. It would suck to find out I've got clone frags if the experiment works, since it takes around a year (almost certainly more in practice) for corals to spawn. I know this is an odd one, but any ideas are very appreciated, thanks!
 
Where are you obtaining information that clones can't produce sexually?

It all depends on the types of corals you are trying to spawn. Some can release both eggs and sperm at same time within the same colony. And while other types only release one or the other, I haven't seen anything definitive yet that says asexual clones can't develop into a specific sex as it grows...or change sex as it were.

Would love to read up on any studies that speaks to the latter...
 
NanoCrazed said:
Where are you obtaining information that clones can't produce sexually?

It all depends on the types of corals you are trying to spawn. Some can release both eggs and sperm at same time within the same colony. And while other types only release one or the other, I haven't seen anything definitive yet that says asexual clones can't develop into a specific sex as it grows...or change sex as it were.

Would love to read up on any studies that speaks to the latter...
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To be clear, I'm not saying cloned corals can't spawn and reproduce in general, most probably can. I'm saying that two corals which are clones of a common mother colony likely cannot fertilize each other. For example, from a section about home aquarium coral spawning in Rich Ross's recent article in Coral Magazine:

"Use Unrelated Corals for Broodstock - Getting gravid corals might be difficult, but it isn’t a prerequisite. What is necessary is getting different genotypes of the same coral species, so you can fertilize the eggs. If you grow a bunch of coral fragments from the same source, they are all clones of each other, and fertilization won’t be successful. You need different genetic material from the same species, for example, Acropora millepora, as suggested by Dr. Craggs. You may be able to get different specimens from different mariculture facilities, or from different aquaculture facilities. You may also be able to work with a collector to responsibly and sustainably collect the same species from different locations."

In any case, even if clones can cross fertilize each other, I'd still like to try my best to obtain unrelated colonies just for the sake of genetic diversity in the offspring. Any ideas? Just noticed in the quote that Rich also suggests working with a collector, hadn't thought of that.
 
Also, I'm mainly interested in corals that are simultaneous hermaphrodites at first, since I don't currently have the capability to reliably identify the sex of gonochoric species.
 
I've seen different variants of acropora valida at many lfs. Since these are coming in wild they all have unique lineages. common corals like that would be your best best
 
max_nano said:
I believe they have to be from a similar region as well so you can replicate the seasonal changes of that area to have them spawn at the same time
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Yes, this would probably make things easier to start off. However I've read (in an article by J. Craggs iirc) that there is some degree of plasticity here, and corals from one region can sync up to a different regions' seasonal changes.
 
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