Are these palys or zoas ?

[agueybana81]

Hi guys. I got a couple of frags that were unidentified at the store. I am wondering what are they. Sorry for the blurry pictures, my phone camera doesn't have a filter, so getting them into focus is hard or the color doesn't show correctly. For the picture under the blue light, the one to the right, the tentacles are all bright instead of how the picture shows where only some spots are bright.

 

[blaxsun]

They look like palythoas, but it’s hard to tell from the images.

 

[MaxTremors]

Impossible to say from the pics. Even with perfectly clear pics in hood lighting it can be really difficult to tell. I’ve heard that you can tell by the mouth and the skirt, but I don’t know how true that is. Plays are generally larger too, but then there are smaller Palys and larger Zoas, and size can vary depending on lighting and conditions. It doesn’t really matter though, they have the same care requirements.

 

[Isopod80]

I can't tell from the pictures but palys will often incorporate sand grains into their stalk tissue. They will also typically accept solid foods. I've never seen a zoa eat solids.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Bottom for sure are Palys (eye lashes are give away). These look like cinnamon brown paly also called brown button Paly

 

[Uzidaisies]

Impossible to say from the pics. Even with perfectly clear pics in hood lighting it can be really difficult to tell. I’ve heard that you can tell by the mouth and the skirt, but I don’t know how true that is. Plays are generally larger too, but then there are smaller Palys and larger Zoas, and size can vary depending on lighting and conditions. It doesn’t really matter though, they have the same care requirements.

It matters a little, from a toxicological standpoint.

 

[Isopod80]

It matters a little, from a toxicological standpoint.

From what I can see the bottom ones look like P. mutuki (relatively harmless) based on the ribbed texture surrounding the closed polyp. The truly dangerous varieties like P. toxica and and P. heliodiscus are known to be smooth textured when closed.

 

[G Santana]

I can't tell from the pictures but palys will often incorporate sand grains into their stalk tissue. They will also typically accept solid foods. I've never seen a zoa eat solids.

This is what I understand to be the difference, I was reading an article which stated that it is virtually impossible to tell differences unless the stalk is basically dissected to look at whether the paly has incorporated substrate material into the base and stalk.

In a lot of instances, it's just impossible to visually tell.

 

[Isopod80]

I can see the substrate grains in my palys stalk tissue, easily. That's not to say all species do this.

 

[James_O]

Bottom one looks like zoas to me.

 

[Rmckoy]

Once upon a time the way to tell them
Apart was
Paly had a distinctive line going from the center of the disk to the outer edge

I could be wrong .
the picture attached has the line on each polyp going from the middle to the outer edge

 

[James_O]

Once upon a time the way to tell them
Apart was
Paly had a distinctive line going from the center of the disk to the outer edge

I could be wrong .
the picture attached has the line on each polyp going from the middle to the outer edge

These are a common Paly just for reference: