Fungai coral advise

[goodtimes]

I have this fungia plate coral that I nearly lost a couple months ago. It is now doing much better but has some algae growth where there was exposed skeleton. Do I just let nature takes it coarse or maybe gently peel or brush away algae?

 

[Tab28]

I believe the flesh will not grow where algae is. If it were mine i would use tweezers to remove as much algae as i could. Dip it and place it in a low light area. Algae can not grow if light is too low. While on subject of algae what is your phosphate level?

 

[no1268]

It Is dead,

 

[goodtimes]

I spent some time with tweezers removing the algae. I'll have to wait and see how it heels up. It looks good this morning though.

 

[Tab28]

Plates heal pretty fast as long as you can keep the algae off the skeleton. The care is the same but to me it actually looks like a cycloseris and not a fungia. If the center is raised. Fungia is completely flat.

 

[goodtimes]

Plates heal pretty fast as long as you can keep the algae off the skeleton. The care is the same but to me it actually looks like a cycloseris and not a fungia. If the center is raised. Fungia is completely flat.

Cycloseris is correct, I didn't know this. Thanks for pointing it out.

 

[tyler1503]

Cycloseris also lack a "scar" on the underside as they don't start life out attached to a rock as fungias do

 

[goodtimes]

A google search shows there are 18 species of fungias.

Fungia, or plate corals, are free-living corals that consist of one large polyp and usually a single mouth. There are 18 recognized species of Fungia, all from the Indo-Pacific,1 and another 10 species of Cycloseris, a very similar, though usually physically smaller, genera of plate corals. A few species of plate corals are easy to tell apart, but many would be difficult for the casual aquarist (like me) to distinguish. A careful examination of the bleached out skeleton might be necessary for proper identification.

I found the terms seem to be mixed a lot while searching vendors sites at corals for sale.

 

[mrcoffee2]

I think it will be fine, try and blow that algae off every day

 

[Tab28]

It is. Cycloseris and fungia at quick glance look very much alike. The raised mouth area in cycloseris may not be evident when young. I have been to several LFS where they are mis-marked. That is not a biggie, since they are still plates and care is the same. Some LFS did not even know of cycloseris. I also have two diaseris plates, know commonly as fragile plates. One is very uncommon in color. Red and teal green. Kinda like a bleeding apple effect.