Jane asked a question about working with Australian Black Whip Coral.\u00a0 Let me say up front, that I have never had the pleasure of working with this material.\u00a0 So, I did some research and came up with the following.(if you want the short answer, go down to para 4 and skip the rest).\u00a0<\/p>\n
First the scientific stuff; Kingdom: Animalia, Phylum: Crindaria, Class: Anthozoa (all black coral fall into this catagory), Order: Antipatharia, Famiy: Antipathidae, Genus: Cirrhipathes<\/p>\n
Now, there is a lot of info there…As I hinted, all black coral falls into the class Anthozoa.\u00a0 However, not all black corals are the same Order.\u00a0 My research over the years (unscientific that is) shows that there is a great deal of confusion and disagreement over whre some of these corals fall.\u00a0 For example, it is pretty much agreed that in the \u00a0Anthozoa class there are two primary orders both of which are soft (or horny) coral ; Antipharia <\/em>which is mainly a deep water black coral and gorgonia <\/em>in shallower waters.\u00a0 Some sources class both as ‘octocorals’ which means they both have 8 septa in their biology.\u00a0 However, some other sources say the Gorgonia <\/em>has 8 septa while the Antipathria <\/em>has only six.\u00a0<\/p>\n Having worked with both, I find there is no significant difference in specific gravity, both are a protein, both contain bromides and iodine, and they grow in the same manner.\u00a0 A significant difference in\u00a0a physical way, is the Antipatharia\u00a0<\/em>has a very rough skin (kind of like sharks skin) and it is harder or more brittle while the Gorgonian <\/em>has a smoother skin and can be easily bent and twisted.\u00a0I do not know how many Genus there are within\u00a0the <\/em>Antipatharian order but there are many Genuses in the Gorgonian.\u00a0<\/em> One of these is the Sea Plume or Sea Feather, which is not even black having a dark or variable brown color and more of a fiberous texture rather than the concentric rings of most of the Geneses of either Orders.\u00a0 But it is afterall, a true ‘octocoral’ so it fits the Anthozoa Class!<\/p>\n Why am I telling you all this?\u00a0 Duh, just to show Jane that from a working standpoint, I believe there is a lot of similarity in the physical structre of Australian Black Whit coral and Sea Plumes.\u00a0 They have very spiney protrusions, tough, and have smooth skin.\u00a0 Sea Plume I have worked….a lot.\u00a0 How do I smooth it Jane? The best way I have found is to make a sanding wheel out of a 6″ square of cardbord, find the center, punch a small hole, cut the cardboard round and glue on a piece of 80 -120 grit sandpaper, put that onto a tapered spindle on an electric motor and turn the length of coral against it.\u00a0You are going to loose the shiney surface but read on.\u00a0 \u00a0Watch out for the dust….wear a dust mask and wash up immediately after a session.\u00a0 Some people are sensitive to the coral dust.\u00a0Next\u00a0you will need a way to get it really smooth….use a Scotch brand scrubbing pad or a fine sanding sponge.\u00a0 Then, on the same motor put on a 5-6″ cotton stitched muslim buff add some ZAM (or black emery if you can’t get ZAM) and polish the coral.\u00a0 It will polish beautifully. Good luck, let me know how it goes.\u00a0<\/p>\n Cheers and Happy New Year, Don.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Jane asked a question about working with Australian Black Whip Coral.\u00a0 Let me say up front, that I have never had the pleasure of working with this material.\u00a0 So, I did some research and came up with the following.(if you want the short answer, go down to para 4 and skip the rest).\u00a0 First the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/userblogs.ganoksin.com\/coralnut\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/48"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/userblogs.ganoksin.com\/coralnut\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/userblogs.ganoksin.com\/coralnut\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/userblogs.ganoksin.com\/coralnut\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/userblogs.ganoksin.com\/coralnut\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/userblogs.ganoksin.com\/coralnut\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/48\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/userblogs.ganoksin.com\/coralnut\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}