Favia ID help

[Rwade]

I purchased this Favia a couple weeks ago and was trying to see if it is a named Favia. It looks a lot like Eyes of Jupiter but I’m not quite sure. Any help would be appreciated.

 

[MaxTremors]

Any name is just a marketing strategy and is ultimately meaningless. Also, 95% sure that is a goniastrea.

 

[Rwade]

I’ll have to look up a goniastrea to see what that is.

 

[Rwade]

Any name is just a marketing strategy and is ultimately meaningless. Also, 95% sure that is a goniastrea.

So is the difference that the walls don’t touch? I have figured out diffences between Favia and Favites, but now you’ve thrown another player at me.

 

[MaxTremors]

So is the difference that the walls don’t touch? I have figured out diffences between Favia and Favites, but now you’ve thrown another player at me.

Some Goniastreas resemble Favias where the corallites don’t share a wall like Favites, and some look a lot like platygyra. They can be difficult to tell apart (goniastrea and favia). Goniastreas have somewhat more pronounced polyps and more prominent septal lobes (the sort of ridges around the mouth not the outer wall). Also, the color is unusual for a Favia. The thing is though, there are like 7-8 genera in the Faviidae/Mussidae families that are very similar (there are tens if not hundreds of species), and there have been a lot of reclassifications over the last decade. It can be nearly impossible to definitively ID corals like this without a detailed examination of the skeleton/corallite, and even then you may need DNA testing for some species. But, just based on the structure of both the polyp and the colony, and the color, I’m pretty sure it’s goniastrea (I’m guessing G. deformis).

 

[Rwade]

Some Goniastreas resemble Favias where the corallites don’t share a wall like Favites, and some look a lot like platygyra. They can be difficult to tell apart (goniastrea and favia). Goniastreas have somewhat more pronounced polyps and more prominent septal lobes (the sort of ridges around the mouth not the outer wall). Also, the color is unusual for a Favia. The thing is though, there are like 7-8 genera in the Faviidae/Mussidae families that are very similar (there are tens if not hundreds of species), and there have been a lot of reclassifications over the last decade. It can be nearly impossible to definitively ID corals like this without a detailed examination of the skeleton/corallite, and even then you may need DNA testing for some species. But, just based on the structure of both the polyp and the colony, and the color, I’m pretty sure it’s goniastrea (I’m guessing G. deformis).

Thanks so much for the details, I looked them up last night but couldn’t find anything that helped explain the differences.

 

[miyags]

Looks like a red eyed purple chalice coral or color variant . Looking more at the growth pattern of the coral.

 

[polyppal]

I agree the structure doesn’t look favia. Whatever you name it, make sure to add 3 letters before the name so it’s worth bazillions

 

[Rwade]

Looks like a red eyed purple chalice coral or color variant . Looking more at the growth pattern of the coral.

The growth pattern does look a lot like this, more so than any of the others I’ve seen.

 

[MaxTremors]

The growth pattern does look a lot like this, more so than any of the others I’ve seen.

Is yours fleshy with polyps that inflate or is more of encrusting and sort of stony.

 

[Rwade]

Is yours fleshy with polyps that inflate or is more of encrusting and sort of stony.

It’s stony and more encrusting, it has pinkish orange coloring around the edges.

 

[MaxTremors]

It’s stony and more encrusting, it has pinkish orange coloring around the edges.

Could be a chalice then (which is a vague category and could be several different genera/species). The photo looked more fleshy to me, but it can be hard to tell from a photo. Do you have a picture under white light?

 

[Rwade]

Could be a chalice then (which is a vague category and could be several different genera/species). The photo looked more fleshy to me, but it can be hard to tell from a photo. Do you have a picture under white light?

I’ll try to get one tomorrow, lights are off for the night and fishies are asleep.

 

[encrustingacro]

It's probably a chalice, since after a reclassification, all favias are in the atlantic

 

[MaxTremors]

It's probably a chalice, since after a reclassification, all favias are in the atlantic

In terms of the hobby, most people still use the name ‘Favia’ (similar to how people still call Micromussa lordhowensis ‘Acan lords’). Of the 91 species that were at some point considered ‘Favias’, 81 have been reclassified, 2 have been confirmed to be Favias, and 9 are sort of in limbo until more research can be done. The 2 Atlantic Favias are not in the hobby. The vast majority of the ‘Favias’ in the hobby are now Dipsastraea and Goniastrea (and a few Coleastrea and Favites). Within the hobby and coral retailers, there has started to be a distinction between Goniastrea and ‘Favia’ (Dipsastraea), but for whatever reason Dipsastraea, while technically correct, hasn’t really caught on amongst hobbyists and retailers.

 

[Rwade]

Could be a chalice then (which is a vague category and could be several different genera/species). The photo looked more fleshy to me, but it can be hard to tell from a photo. Do you have a picture under white light?

 

[Rwade]

This is under white light. One other thing of note, it can eat a pretty big piece of food. I feed LRS and squirt some over this coral, each mouth will suck down whatever lands on it pretty quickly unless two mouths are playing tug of war.

 

[Cell]

echinata perhaps?

 

[Rwade]

echinata perhaps?

I suppose it could be possible, none of my 3 Echinatas look the same. This one does have small 1/4” tentacles that extend from the polyps at times, my Echinatas do not have that.

 

[Rwade]

For the record, I’m pretty sure it’s not an Echinata; I blasted water at my Echinatas and they shrink up, this coral is stony.