礁石水族馆的爱好一直对任何新的或独特的珊瑚菌株和品种都有一定程度的痴迷。因此,毫不奇怪的是,当Reefers首次开始在Acros和Montis等SPS珊瑚中发现不规则的颜色时,我们不可避免地对这种蛋白质感染现象感到非常好奇,这种蛋白质感染被称为“嫁接”。
We’ve dabbled in many examples of corals with pigment grafting including the绿色外套,A. Suharsonoi,溅Astreopora, and currently working with the high profileRainbow Splice Acroand a unique bicolored colony ofHero coral. Needless to say we have more than our fair share of experience with GFP Infection in various groups of corals and after more than two decades since it was first documented, we are no longer that excited for (most) corals which exhibit this curiosity.
引起我们兴奋的原因是,荧光蛋白感染是高度可预测的,在大多数情况下,一种颜色总是会主导另一种颜色,从而导致固体颜色的珊瑚群。Sure you see these pictures and classic examples of a dramatically swirling grafted cap with a perfect ratio of two colors contrasting wildly but these examples are few and far between and invariably take a lot of ‘managing’ to encourage this kind of bicolored development in a single coral.
It’s precisely this variability that makes GFP infected corals exciting but it also means that there’s a wide range of values associated with certain strains like the Rainbow Splice Acropora. Everyone wants a frag of the ‘Splice with an even blend of both colors in the hopes of growing out aperfectly streaked specimen就像我们几个月前在视频中展出的那样,但仍然无法保证珊瑚如何发展。
最新蛋白感染的珊瑚菌株之一是粘液时间Montipora digitatafrom Eye Catching Corals which is a red branching Monti with green fluorescent pigment (or maybe the other way around). We’ve tried growing out this bicolored SPS coral several times over the last couple of years and every time the colony grows mostly green branches with a little bit of red pigment remaining at the base, just like the header image at the top of this article.
Short of constantly pruning back every green branch that grows out we don’t know what we can do to attain a single colony of digitata where the branches are 50/50 red or green, or better yet, an erratic mix of both pigments throughout each branch. If you’re reallyinto itthe GFP infection of corals can be an awesome and interesting aspect of biology to tinker with, experimenting with fragging and actually grafting pieces back together, but you shouldn’t pay a premium for these oddities unless you appreciate that the coral will probably become a solid color if left to develop unattended.