Coralmania pt 1

MiNdErAsR

Dark Lord of Sriracha!
Staff member
RC Mod
Hi Eric,
Just curious. For all of us with a web site devoted to our tank(s), we tend to insist on labeling the coral we keep (in my case Acroporids) so as to differentiate between the pictures. :) I understand identification to the species level would be about impossible for the average aquarist. How would you suggest we go about placing a name to a picture (short of "blue acropora", "green acropora", or "acropora 1", "2", etc.)? I understand there is a term which means "looks like" or "similar to" that can be used, but it slips my mind. Can you help?

Thanks for the great article. Looking forward to the next installment.
 
Well, you can wait for this month's article and it might help some!

I think the best way to do this, given that I really seriously doubt you will be able to accurately say what species you have, is to use a "group name."

These can be found in Wallace's book. For example, the Acropora selago group would contain selago, tenuis, eurystoma, striata, donei, yongei, loisettae and dendrum. The florida group contains only florida and sarmentosa. I'm not sure for each coral you can even get it this far, but you shouldbe able to for most. That way, you are not compromising accuracy, you have gone significantly below genus level, and have coral species that generally have quite a bit in common with each other, taxonomically and probably biologically as well in many cases. After all, even for a larger group, getting it down from 400 to less than five or ten is pretty significant!!
 
Oh - almost forgot. Carden Wallace has a smaller book (Wallace, C. C. and Aw, M. (2000).Ã"šÃ‚  Acropora Staghorn corals, A getting to know you and identification guide. OceanNEnvironment. Sydney. 128 pp) that is a guide for field observers....in other words, how to tell whatcha got in a living Acropora...its a must for anyone interested in the subject as you are.
 
Back
Top