coral(s) ID please

[Mihai]

Hi,

This corals came with some LR (Kaelini) from premiumaquatics.
I find them very pretty -> they look very delicate. The branches are about 2-3mm diameter, the whole colony is a 2-3cm across. All branches are hard, I didn't see any polips on them. They are also smooth.

Can I save them? Can they make it under 160W of NO fluorescent?

Also, the second thing that is very hard to see, but it looks like a small dark red coral (just like in the picture).

Finally, the third coral came with caraibbean LR, and looks like #2 except that is smooth. It's also very small (3-4mm), and it's not growing too much, maybe 1mm in the last month. It's just a small round button that is attached on the LR. it doesn't seem to have any openings or polips (just like #2).

I'm not sure if #2 and #3 are corals...

Thanks for the help

 

[John_Brandt]

I think I have some bad news for you, Mihai. Those white branchy things are dead. They probably were coralline algae.

I can't tell what #3 is. It might be sponge. Can you take a better close-up shot that is in sharp focus?

 

[Mihai]

That's really bad news if correct. However, at the bottom of the LR box I found one of those branches that broke off during shipment. I placed it in the tank and in 2 days it became completely white (and to the best of my guess dead). The rest of these things however didn't lose the color... yet?

And algae... this things look very close to the "Thorny Bush Coral"
Seriatopora hystrix except that they are smooth and hystrix is rough...

I'll try to focus the camera better, although I find it very difficult (I don't know why, outside the aquarium it works like a charm - and no, it's not focusing on the glass).

Mihai

 

[John_Brandt]

Mihai, what is the country of origin of the live rock pictured here?

There are branched coralline algaes that look very much like coral skeletons after they have bleached (died). When these algae are living they tend to be purple or pink in color. I can't yet completely rule out that that is dead Seriatopora. The smooth texture suggests algae not coral. But I suspect it is dead whatever it is.

If you have to remove it from the tank to get a better focused close-up, please do.

 

[Mihai]

Wow. I see, then those were some NICE algae. I want more of those. I hope that they'll come back after the rock cures. I liked them.
The fact that there are no polyps to be seen also suggests thate they are not corals. I'll try to get a better picture of the small things. I don't think that it's a sponge: it's hard and not squishy.

Regarding the LR origin I'm not sure: premium aquatics only said
"It's a south pacific live rock,", the name is "Kaelini Tonga Ultra Show Live Rock", but the real origin... I have no idea.

Thanks,
Mihai

 

[John_Brandt]

Wow. I see, then those were some NICE algae. I want more of those. I hope that they'll come back after the rock cures. I liked them.
The fact that there are no polyps to be seen also suggests thate they are not corals. I'll try to get a better picture of the small things. I don't think that it's a sponge: it's hard and not squishy.

Regarding the LR origin I'm not sure: premium aquatics only said
"It's a south pacific live rock,", the name is "Kaelini Tonga Ultra Show Live Rock", but the real origin... I have no idea.

Thanks,
Mihai

Mihai, Tonga is an island country in the South Pacific. Because you don't see polyps now does not mean that it wasn't once a living coral. The polyp is the live animal itself, the white skeleton it secretes is not, and was not, the living animal itself. IOW, if this is dead Seriatopora coral we should not expect to see polyps now. But we would expect to see (and feel) tiny bumps in the skeleton where the polyps once lived. If you can break off a few branches and look under a magnifying glass you might be able to see key structures to identify what this stuff is/was.

There is really no question that those white branchy things are not sponge. What may be living sponge is the thing you have tagged as #3. If you provide a better close-up picture of #3 we might be able to tell if it is living sponge.

 

[Mihai]

Mihai, Tonga is an island country in the South Pacific.

I agree, but it is my understanding that those denominations are more marketing than really reflecting the true origin (I heard the same thing about Fiji and Marshall rocks). But it should be from somewhere in that vecinity anyway.

There are absolutely no bumps on the skin. Also, on broken branches there are no interior tubes/holes. This again points toward the algae ID. Furthermore, on the same rock I found 1 single small broken fragment of a purple thing just like the others, which again confirms your diagnostic for algae.

Now for #3 (you don't really have a chance to solve #2, I don't have a decent picture of that - yet). That's the one that I said that's "hard".
It's not bone hard (like the algae #1), but it's not soft either... it's like a bean.

The gods were not so merciful as with the coral (see updates in the coral and worm posting http://reefs.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=45355), and so I didn't get an in-focus shot despite spending about 1h with the Canon G3. The only thing I cleared up is that it is imposible to get an image in focus using the manual focus :-(.
The attached pictures are the best I got. There are from 2 such objects in different places, but clearly the same animal (plant?).

Thanks,
Mihai

 

[Mihai]

overcoming the 3 attachement limit.
Remember, these things are like 2-4mm long... and also these things are from the caribbean rock, not from Pacific.

Thanks,
Mihai

 

[John_Brandt]

The pink things might be foraminiferans. We need better shots.