TM

Limited Edition
Acropora simplex
Grafted Simplex

Reeffarmers Acropora simplex Grafted Simplex Image of Colony Base Area Sept 9th 2005
Note - Broken branch was of dead branch that had been stung by another coral
Image Copyright © 2005 by Reeffarmers All Rights Reserved.

Original Grafting Area of Reeffarmers Acropora simplex
Original Grafting Slide from Steve Tyree Presentation Images taken August 2004
Image Copyright © 2005 by Steve Tyree All Rights Reserved.


Proof that the Grafted Green Fluorescing Pigment is different then the faint green within the original
Acropora simplex coral Original Grafting Slide from Steve Tyree Presentation Images taken August 2004
Image Copyright © 2005 by Steve Tyree All Rights Reserved.

This Acropora simplex coral was probably one of the first pigment grafted corals offered for sale within the US captive market. What do we mean by pigment grafting ? We believe that what occured with this coral may represent either a rare occurance of a natural physical process within the world of corals or could possibly be the first observation of a more common natural physical process. Since this type of pigment transfer between corals had not been previously discussed within the scientific coral community, we believe it is a previously unknown rare and physically possible phenomenon. Up to this point however the anectodal observations await scientific proof and verification. What happened was that a bright green Pocilloporidae coral fell and came into contact with an Acropora simplex cultured coral colony transhipped from Bali. They probably remained in contact for a week and when they were pulled apart, the Acropora simplex had some bright green pigments on it. The coral was normally Purple Brown with Blue Tips. Under strong light it goes more blue. Under weak light that Acropora simplex can become more greenish. It normally has an ability to develop minor amounts of a specific green fluorescing pigment that is excited by UV and not violet. The bright green pigment from the Pocilloporidae is a pigment that fluoresces strongly under violet light and only weakly under UV light. This makes the identification of the pigment very easy. Unfortunately we do not have the original Pocilloporidae coral because it was sold. Initially Steve Tyree assumed the bright green spot on the acropora would dissapear. But over the following months, the spot not only did not dissapear, it actually began to increase in size. We suspect that the Pocilloporidae coral was a bright green thin branched Stylophora pistillata that is some times mistaken for bright green Pocillopora damicornis. There is also the possibility that the Pocilloporidae was actually the very bright green Pocillopora damicornis. Please note - Aquarists should exercise caution if they attempt pigment grafting experiments. Most stony corals appear too aggressive to be able to safely transfer or graft pigments. The Acropora simplex may be a non-agressive coral that is capable of pigment grafting. This particular Acropora seems to be moderately difficult to keep. We have had it go through two phases where tissue slowly dissapeared, but the coral was trimmed and these problems went away. Perhaps the coral is sensitive to salinity fluctations as we were experiencing some in that corals reef during that time. It might also be sensitive to fluctuations in KH. Luckily we kept the coral growing and we have sold some fragments of this coral as exotic $50 frags. However, let us be clear that NONE of those early fragments contained the Bright Green Pocilloporidae Pigments. We did realize as the pigmentation began to grow in size that it would become important to keep track of any grafted fragments of this coral that were produced. We are hoping that at some point in the future we can get scientific DNA proof of what we believed occurred. As can be seen in the images below, the pigments remained in the lower colony sections while upper branches were harvested. The green Pocilloporidae pigments later began moving up the base of branches. There is the possibility that the green pigments could completely cover the coral, but hopefully we can keep propagating the morph that has only minor streaks or splotches of the Pocillopridae green fluorescing pigment. One way to do that is by making a propagated fragment that only has a trace of the green pigment. Another way would be to harvest areas of the coral covered by the green. Reeffarmers guarantees that a significant amount of the unique Green Fluorescing Pigment will be present in the base area of each fragment. The fragment however will not contain more then 50 % coverage of the Pocilloporidae Green fluorescing pigment. There might be some very exciting pigment patterns that develop in these mixed pigment propagated fragments. Steve Tyree is maintaining the original parent colony of this coral for reeffarmers.com in one of his 125 gallon naturally filtered Tri-Zonal Reef Aquariums. In Steve's captive reef the coral is positoned to recieve moderate light under a 400 watt 20,000 K Radium Metal Halide. Limited Edition Reservation price for fragments Reeffarmers guarantees to contain some of the unique Green Fluorescing pigment is currently $105 per small sized fragment. The bimonthly limited edition reservation schedules can be found below.

Update August 18th 2009 - Please note that we suspended fragment shipments during the summer of 2006. What happened was that the base of the colony was covered with Bryopsis algae and the base was killed off before we had the time to notice the problem. There had been three reservations harvested. One of those went to Clint Conway. There is currently only one known surviving fragment of the Grafted Simplex #1. Mike Poletti of Sacramento is the only one with this version and he had acquired a fragment from Clint Conway. Reeffarmers was able to salvage a large branch of the original colony, but it lacked any grafted spots. We let this branch grow for well over a year into a small colony. Then when we got time to revisit this experimental coral, we attempted grafting #2. We used a fluorescent green Pocillopora damicornis and managed to succesfully transfer pigments using the forced contact grafting technique. These grafted spot areas were purchased by World Wide Corals since we wanted to establish a version of this coral on the east coast. WWC has the only spots from Grafting #2. We then proceeded to do grafting #3 with the same green Pocillopora damicornis and it was successful. We now have a medium sized colony with about 4 different green grafted pigment spots. We will be growing and harvesting Grafted Simplex #3 and shipping those for the reservations on this web page. We will add images of grafting #2 and grafting #3 when we get time over the next few months.

Grafted Simplex Colony Development Sequence
January 4th 2005
February 8th 2005
April 20th 2005
April 29th 2005
May 29th 2005
June 25th 2005
All Six Images Copyright © 2005 by Reeffarmers All Rights Reserved.

This growth sequence demonstrates how we developed our main colony. Originally the Pocilloporidae Green Fluorescing pigment only covered less then 10 % of the colony. What we did was harvest and sell normal Acropora simplex fragments (without the Pocilloporidae Green). This allowed the Pocilloporidae Green Pigment in the original colony to continue cloning new pigments and to eventually cover close to 50 % of the colony. Green Pocilloporidae pigment has also grown up into branches and has developed some very unique pigmentation patterns.
The term 'Pigment Grafting' is not the accepted scientific terminology to define the process that has occurred with this coral. This specific use of the term by Steve Tyree was intended to be a common useage that helps the average coral aquarist or coral farmer understand the process that may have occurred. What could be occurring using scientific terminology is 'fluorophore synthesis' or 'fluorophore cloning'. The scientific community has been doing some excellent cutting edge research on this topic in recent years. Most of this research has been in the biotechnology or biochemistry fields.
Acropora simplex Grafted Simplex Year 2009 BiMonthly Limited Edition Schedule

January
 Grafting #3 Reserved for M. Schwitters
March
 Grafting #3 Reserved for S. Hansen
May
 Grafting #3 Reserved for R. Rhode
July
 Grafting #3 Reserved for S. Ledin
September
 Grafting #3 Reserved for G. Kaplan
November
 Grafting #3 Reserved for D. Wong

Acropora simplex Grafted Simplex Year 2010 BiMonthly Limited Edition Schedule

January
 Grafting #3 Reserved for M. Araujo
March
 Grafting #3 Reserved for J. Davila
May
 Grafting #3 Reserved for B. Perron
July
 Grafting #3 Reserved for M. Harrington
September
 Grafting #3 Reserved for R. Cooke
November
 Grafting #3 Reserved for A. Rodriguez

Acropora simplex Grafted Simplex Year 2011 BiMonthly Limited Edition Schedule

January
 Grafting #3 Available
March
 Grafting #3 Available
May
 Grafting #3 Available
July
 Grafting #3 Available
September
 Grafting #3 Available
November
 Grafting #3 Available

Acropora simplex Grafted Simplex Year 2005 BiMonthly Limited Edition Schedule

November
 First Edition Grafting #1 Auction for $150.01

Acropora simplex Grafted Simplex Year 2006 BiMonthly Limited Edition Schedule

January
 Grafting #1 Shipped to E. Nichols
March
 Grafting #1 Delivered to C. Conway
May
 Grafting #3 Reserved for S. Garrett
July
 Grafting #3 Reserved for J. Gallaway
September
 Grafting #3 Reserved for G. Adkins
November
 Grafting #3 Reserved for R. Barton

Acropora simplex Grafted Simplex Year 2007 BiMonthly Limited Edition Schedule

January
 Grafting #3 Reserved for B. Wilson
March
 Grafting #3 Reserved for S. Spargur
May
 Grafting #3 Reserved for G. Schwabb
July
 Grafting #3 Reserved for A. Andrasz
September
 Grafting #3 Reserved for J. Stoffel
November
 Sold as Buy It Now

Acropora simplex Grafted Simplex Year 2008 BiMonthly Limited Edition Schedule

January
 Grafting #3 Reserved for C. Owens
March
 Grafting #3 Reserved for J. Hoselton
May
 Grafting #3 Reserved for F. Bray
July
 Grafting #3 Reserved for I. Hartwell
September
 Grafting #3 Reserved for E. Grant
November
 Grafting #3 Reserved for A. Dorton

To inquire about reserving a limited edition farmed fragment of this coral please send an email to reeffarmers@aceweb.com.
Copyright © 2005 by Reeffarmers All Rights Reserved.
BACK TO Limited Editions page