Elegance coral, Catalaphyllia jardinei, is one of the all-time most iconic coral from the early days of reefing. Once regarded as a bulletproof beginner’s coral, for the better part of the last ten years Indonesian-sourced elegance corals have been all but impossible to keep; save for a very few specimens, most that were imported tended to look great for one to several weeks after which point they would just shrink up and die, oftentimes succumbing to brown jelly infections. With the opening of coral collections from Australia, one of the promises was a well-handled Elegance coral that was a lot hardier once it arrived in American reef shops.
After a couple of years of regarding the claim of healthy elegance corals with some healthy skepticism, we’ve recently been won over by an abundance of vigorous looking elegance corals, particularly those with small little skeletons and polyps that extend 3-4″/8-10cm from the corallite. Last summer we had the opportunity to pick up a cute nano piece of Australian elegance coral with a thumb-sized skeleton. It’s been 4-5 months now and the piece is still going strong, looking like it will soon outgrow the confines of the LED nano cube and truly deserving of the name “Elegance” coral; the long graceful tentacles and the bright purple tip reminds us daily why this species, Catalaphyllia jardinei was once a perennial favorite. There is now an abundance of healthy small elegance corals at most major livestock retailers and since everyone is still ga-ga for any coral that is chalice, acan or scolie, the small elegance corals are mostly overlooked and selling for a very reasonable $60-80. Perhaps it may be time to lift the taboo on the elegance corals from Australia. We’d love to hear your experiences with the Elegance corals from down under, please share with us in the comments below and in the poll after the break.
Have you tried to keep an Australian elegance coral?(online surveys)
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