Truncatoflabellum is a genus of Azoox corals so obscure, and rarely documented (alive), that we never had hope of seeing specimens in our aquariums. Thankfully, Cairns Marine, purveyor of so much exotic marine life from Australia has scored again by…
Coral
New Zoanthid Species Recruited to Fight Cancer
New species of zoanthids aren’t described all that often, but it turns out that we should be paying more attention to this understudied group of reef animals. One of the four new zoanthid species described from southern Florida, a Palythoa species, has…
Unseen Corals: Acropora pinguis might be the thickest-branching staghorn coral
Acropora pinguis is a very special coral that we’ve never seen in the aquarium hobby, and there’s probably very good reason for that. If you discount staghorn corals of the Isopora genus, the big cat’s paw corals, then Acropora pinguis forms the…
Marine Aquarium Acronyms: PE Defined
The marine aquarium hobby is second only to the US military when it comes to the number of acronyms its members throw around. (Quite fittingly, this past Monday was the 27th anniversary of my DOE. Shortly after that date, I…
Fluorescent Friday: Focus on World Wide Corals’ ‘Grafted Cap’
The phenomenon of ‘GFP Infection’ in stony corals is documented well enough that reefers are actively looking for it, sometimes induce it, and we even ‘groom’ certain corals to train the colors to spread in a deliberate way. Many different…
Reefer’s eye view of dying corals on the Great Barrier Reef
For the past two to three weeks, the bleaching of the Great Barrier Reef has been all over the news, and there’s hardly a day that goes by that new pictures and reports come in of how dire the situation…
Micromussa pacifica finally gives Indonesian ‘Acan Maxima’ a real name
Micromussa pacifica is a name that we’ve all been waiting for to identify an undescribed coral for nearly a decade. Ever since the small ‘Indonesian Scolymia’ popped up on the radar of reefers, it’s gone by many names but we…
Dreamy coral reef scape of the Denver Downtown Aquarium
It used to be that us reefers would visit zoos and public aquariums and have pity on the sorry excuses for a saltwater aquarium that passed as a reef tank. Those days are long since gone and nowadays public aquarists…
‘Clown Face’ zoanthids are part of a whole new breed of Palythoa
Zoanthids are some of the most popular and collectable group of corals for the home aquarium. We’ve never personally been sucked into the zoanthid craze but we’ve always reserved a greater amount of interest and respect for the larger polyped Palythoa…
Insane purple Acropora suharsonoi with neon green ‘GFP infection’
This exceptionally stunning purple Acropora suharsonoi with swirls of green fluorescent protein has just been obtained by Bali Aquarium. Rare and aberrant reef fish pop up on our radar like everyday but one of a kind coral specimens such as this…