Colt coral - Having trouble staying on

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[I recently fragged some colt coral on to a small rock. I wanted to use the plastic toothpicks to secure it to the rock but i didn't have any so i used just a rubber band. For some weird reason, the colt keeps comming off. I lost it... Has anyone else fragged colt and had success??? I just need a way to get it to stay.]
 
[I've done what you did before with a colt, and a rubber band. Are you sure you are getting it on tight enough? Where are you trying to attach the rubber band? You might try a dab or two of super glue, then rubber band.]
 
[I second the rubber band. You can make it very tight. What is happening? Is the rubber band cutting through the frag? If that is the case try a wider rubber band. I have several frags in my tank that I used a rubber band to attach, even a couple colts that I got from Duane, which by the way Duane, are doing great. :D]
 
[So no toothpick and a wider rubberband? What if i used a zip tie instead. I'v used them for fragging my leather before, and have had great results. Does it need to be really tight? How long should i leave it alone before i try to pull the rubberband/zip tie off?]
 
[I have never used a zip tie, I guess it would work but then again if the frag thins out then it would be loose again and you would have to zip it a little tighter, the rubber band keeps constant pressure. I usually left mine on for at least a week to 10 days, then I just snip the rubber band with some scissors and slide it out.]
 
[Hopefully this post is on topic, I simply dried a piece of live rock, applied super glue gel, dried the bottom of my colt slightly and pushed it into the rock, counted to five and then placed it into my tank. Three months and the little guy has not moved and has grown alot. Also you might want to move the colt away from flow area for while to let him attach if you are just using rubber bands. End of hopefully on topic post.]
 
[weird usually colt is too slimey to do that. just go to walmart and buy some plastic NOT WOOD toothpicks. works better, and easier to get the coral where you want it, in the direction you want it. they never look too happy with the rubber band...]
 
[@heelhook wrote:
weird usually colt is too slimey to do that. just go to walmart and buy some plastic NOT WOOD toothpicks. works better said:
Just curious...What's the deal with not using WOOD toothpicks?]
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[I used wood thoothpics to atyach my xenias.

I have heard colts are one of the hardest soft coral to get to attach and many people have problems. I put some rock rubble on one side of my tank and just dropped the frag there. It was attached in about 2 weeks after that.]
 
[You can buy some brides netting (very inexpensive) and use it to secure pieces of corals to live rock. You can secure the netting with rubber bands or thread around the ends of the live rock, you can also use a needle and thread to put the needle through the base of the coral and then pull enough of the thread through to secure it around the live rock. This works pretty good when the coral is one of those that produce a lot of slime. The thread can be cut and removed after the coral is attatched.]
 
[My personal preference for most softies is to take to pieces of rubble rock, put the piece between them and rubber band the three pieces together.

That seems to work best for me anyways.

Just my .02]
 
[Some people don't like this method but I use it all the time with softies and very good results. The Stitch, thats right I use some fishing line (light weight) and a sewing needle to run the line through the base of the softie and then tie the line into or through the rock holding the frag. For those of you cringing right now I didn't come up with this myself, I got it straight from Anthony Calfo's book on Coral Propagation.]
 
[If you lean a piece of rock against the base of the colt it will attach and then you can use a razor blade to cut the pieces appart. It takes about a week for both pieces to heal.]
 
[I just used the method pokeradam suggested.

I had a colt to which I tried the toothpick method for 2 weeks but it didn't work. The hole that the toothpick went into just kept getting wider and wider and after 2 weeks when I took the toothpick out, the colt just fell off the rock.

So I leaned an heavy rock against the base of the coral for about a week so it wouldn't move. The colt attached to both rocks and I had to pry one of the rocks off. I though that this might happen so the rock that I didn't want the colt to attach to was touching it only at one small point (just enough to apply some pressure and keep the colt from moving). This took one week and the colt is looking great.]
 
[The problem with using wooden toothpicks is only that in some cases the toothpick just gets left in the coral and never removed. This is okay with a plastic toothpick, but with a wooden one it can rot inside the coral and cause a problem]
 
[Yes, and the plastic toothpick is the solution. Plus the way the coral is mounted in a piece of skeleton shaped like a baby carrier. That allows the coral to secure its foot while not putting pressure on the toothpick wound.]
 
[Ive always done something similar to what senior set says,,,but I used Cheese cloth,, I would throw the small (Rubble)rock and the frag on a piece of cheesecloth and wrap the cloth all the way around the rubble then tie wrap the ends,, leave it for 2-3 three days then cut the cheese cloth off,, always attached for me....]
 
[Hey, I'm glad I found this thread! I've had a piece of colt floating around in my tank for weeks now that I haven't been able to get attached to anything.

Thanks for the tips, hopefully, I can find the thing tonight. :wwww:]
 
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