The Butternuts Boulder Porites has an exciting combination of pigments. The center of the corallites contain a solid bright chocolate pigmentation. This contrasts rather well with the butternut tan pigments that develop on the corallite ridges. As can be seen in the closeup image above the corals colors are developed by pigments located in dense chunks or pigment sprinkles. Koral Hackerz acquired our seed colony from Renegade Reefers member StiffLeather. Julia acquired her original colony of this coral from Hacknpack.com who transhipped the coral in from Indo Polynesia. The coral was then immediately cut up into individual corallites and packed it out for shipping. Julie refers to this coral as the Butternuts Boulder because the coral will expand its tissue at night slightly and when removed from an aquarium and rolled down a hill, this coral simulates the smooth rolling behavior of a boulder. Steve Tyronne is maintaining a seed section of this coral for KoralHackers.com in a 125 gallon naturally filtered PentaZonal system. This system is naturally filtered with a cryptic zone, filter feeder zone, reef flat exposed zone, a PVC plumbing zone and an open water zone. The coral appears to prefer moderate current. In Tyronne’s captive reef the coral is positioned 15 inches away from a 175 watt 5,000 K Coralife metal halide. The rich earthy tones lose their luster when kept under light with higher color temperatures. The coral appears to develop its most intense coloration under moderate illumination. This helps to maintain the brilliant butternut corallite center pigments. Price is currently $65 per single corallite.
