Strawberry Coral?

[trybka]

Hello all,

I was in the LFS yesterday and they had a shipment of what they called "Strawberry Coral." The owner and all knowledgeble one wasn't in but one of the employees said he had it in his tank and that it preferred to be under shade and in a high flow area.... He didn't know the latin name and we looked in Eric Borneman's book hoping to find it but we weren't positive of what it was... It was a colony of smooth BRIGHT RED soft short (2") stubs. There were no visible polyps but the employee said that's probably because he had just put it in the tank.

The employee said it liked a lot of phytoplankton and he fed it twice a week.

So... anyone have a clue as to what this might be? I've been looking around hoping to figure it out because I'm interested in buying sone but I want to verify this information before I get it.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Ninong]

If you have Borneman's new book, Aquarium Corals, it's right there on page 136: Dendronepthya. It's aposymbiotic and considered very difficult to keep because it requires constant feeding of phytoplankton and/or zooplankton.

Ninong

[ August 11, 2001: Message edited by: Ninong ]

 

[pathos]

actually, it's probably not Dendronepthya, it is Alcyonium or Chili Coral, also known as Strawberry Coral. I have one in my tank and it does great.

 

[trybka]

you could be right pathos....... it looked more like that than the pictures of dendro.

 

[trybka]

Thanks Ninong..... I wasn't 100 percent sure because most of what I'd seen of Dendronepthya has some white and this was nothing but bright red.... Guess I'll stay away.