Brain coral hitchhiker

[Zafak]

I currently have a 20 gallon reef that is only a few months old. I'm planning on upgrading to a bigger tank soon, so I have been buying more live rock and curing it in another tank (in case it cycles) to be combined with my older live rock into the bigger tank.

One of my new pieces of live rock has a single coral polyp on it. I know that it is a brain coral, but it is different enough from my acan that I'm not sure what species it is. After a few days in the new tank, it has formed 3 air bubbles in its flesh that have me worried that it may not make it.

Can anyone give it an id and let me know what to expect with the bubbles? Thanks!

 

[Zafak]

I'm on a phone and couldn't get two pictures to upload on the first post. But here is how it looked before it started to bubble.

 

[Tweaked]

Yep common little brain coral that comes out of the Caribbean. Don't have the scientific name off hand, but look up coral from that region. They typically die due to people's tanks not being stable yet. GL

 

[cloak]

I'm not sure about the bubbles, but the hitchhiker might be a Caribbean Rose coral.

 

[Zafak]

Thank you so much for the replies. From what I'm reading, getting rose coral as a hitchhiker on live rock is the only legal way to acquire it. Otherwise it is protected from collecting from the wild. Since it is a bit rarer than I expected, I'm going to use today's water change to drip acclimate it on its rock to my main tank.

On closer examination it has 4 mouths and the three bubbles have combined into 2 bubbles. I've also watched it extend tentacles. They are not as long and numerous as my acan, but it does have them.

 

[rt67ghy]

I'd feed it Coral Frenzy (5mm pellets) daily until I see good growth. I've brought some sun corals back from the edge with this method when they came as skeletons on a live rock.