Historic Stuber Acropora photograph documents 25 years of stony coral reefing

The photo above was made 25 years ago, on 26 June 1985, in the aquarium of Dietrich Stüber, Berlin by Svein Fossa, an internationally recognized expert in reef keeping. This historic photograph is the first known documented case of an SPS coral growing and thriving in captivity. Back in 1985 and well into the early 1990s it was still widely believed that it was impossible to grow stony corals in captivity and we can still recall a FAMA article from 1990 where the author was absolutely beside himself because his Millipora fire coral had grown something like a quarter inch over a period of three months. Much has happened in the intervening years and the stuber Acropora is probably the most widely distributed stony coral strain with colonies residing on every continent of the world save for Antarctica.