Red Monti Cap is there such a thing?

exnisstech · Sep 12, 2022

Ok let me rephrase my original question. Is there a monti cap available that looks red when compared to one that looks orange?

jDoSe · Sep 12, 2022

In my opinion, yes. I’ve seen them in person. However, what passes as red to me may not pass as red to others. I am very picky and a stickler to details, but maybe not as much as you.

That’s where you have to just compare corals to each other and try find the reddest possible. Unfortunately, the selection at most lfs is pretty poor, so you’d have to just search until you find one you like.

Keep in mind the closer to 255, 0, 0 you get, the rarer it is and thus the more you will likely have to pay (unless the seller doesn’t know what he has). But keep in mind, online sellers know this so they will adjust their photos to look more red to get a premium. When you get the wysiwyg coral and it’s orange-ish in your tank, they will say “well it looks red to me, it’s the lighting”. You may have to waste some money to get what you want.

Pure red is rare. Pure orange is rare (much less rare than red). Everything in the middle is common and gets rarer at the extremes.
It’s like trying to find a yellow acro (or a vibrant orange acro). Not tan, not brown, not green, but pure yellow. Pretty much impossible. There are some cases where there was an agreeably-yellow acro, but it then turned completely green in captivity. Was there some sort of combination of lighting, spectrum, intensity, trace elements, etc that caused it to be yellow? Yes, but who knows how to replicate that. A lot of times what would replicate that would affect other colorful corals negatively. Same for the pure orange acros out there (not counting other sps like setosa).

exnisstech · Sep 12, 2022

jDoSe said:
But keep in mind, online sellers know this so they will adjust their photos to look more red to get a premium. When you get the wysiwyg coral and it’s orange-ish in your tank, they will say “well it looks red to me, it’s the lighting”. You may have to waste some money to get what you want.

Thank you for your time and information sharing.
I look at photos online, even vendors on here and just shake my head because I know there is no way the corals they show look any where near the colors they are displaying in their adds. I'm no expert on color but have dabbled in digital photography enough to ussualy be able to tell if colors shown are accurate or at least close to accurate.

enlighten · Oct 23, 2024

encrustingacro said:
No, there is not really such thing as a red monti cap, as (almost) all of the 'monti caps' in the aquarium trade are not actually from the species montipora capricornis, but from other plating species, such as m. florida and m. foliosa. True montipora capricornis are dull purple, don't have any tuberculae or papillae (but still has a rough coenosteum), and have a wavy texture on the plates.

Any ID on these? Hoping to graft with purple cap. I came across this thread in hopes to find out if it was worth getting the ORA Orange cap as well to add to my collection. But i went to look at my red caps and today they looked really orange lol.

encrustingacro · Oct 23, 2024

enlighten said:
Any ID on these? Hoping to graft with purple cap. I came across this thread in hopes to find out if it was worth getting the ORA Orange cap as well to add to my collection. But i went to look at my red caps and today they looked really orange lol.

Some other species of Montipora, not capricornis. I'm not very knowledgeable on Acroporid species-level IDs.

PS. I have heard that artifical grafting is a myth and most of the grafted corals in the hobby actually come from protein infections from the neighboring coral.