[Dazureus]

I bought a few corals the other day from one store and saw them for a greatly increased price at another. I was just wondering if anyone can ID these either with names or personal experience as to price. Just wondering which store is on the up and up. I've had the first montipora cap. and the tricolor for a while but the other two are new. Thanks for all replies.

Monti cap (?) 1





monti cap (?) 2



Tyree purple monster (?)

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Acropora Tricolor

[Ninong]

According to Steve Tyree, the polyps on the Purple Monster are "extremely small for an Acropora and white."



Here is the full text of his comments:

The Purple Monstor Coral has been written about and talked about by quite a few reefkeepers now. I thought I would include this Purple Monster Page to give reefkeepers some facts behind the coral. This coral was exported from the Solomon Islands in 1995. Since then, I have seen thousands of corals exported from the Solomons and Fiji. I have not seen this coral in any of those shipments since 1995. There are corals that are similar to the monster and I have given these the name of Purple Monster - Like corals. What is unique about the monster is the shape of the branches which taper to a point with short rounded corallites and its unique intense coloration. In fact one of the corals that came in that 1995 shipment (which unfortunately did not make it) was shaped like a minature christmas tree. The polyps are extremelly small for an Acropora and white. This species is very difficult to keep and has a very slow growth rate. Slow growth rates are typical for corals that are difficult and have very small polyps. I believe there are only a handful of living fragments of this coral with probably less than 6 surviving. I know some people are out there selling purple monstor fragments but what they probably have are purple monster-like fragments. The purple monster coral grows too slow to be a good candidate for farming. If you have recieved a fragment compare it to the above pictures to verify if it is the real Purple Monster.

Veron (author of Corals of Australia and the Indo-Pacific) has seen the mother colony and could not identify it. He guessed that it might be an Acropora valida since he has seen that species grow into this unique morphology or shape. The uniqueness in the form is the tapering shape of the thick branches. They almost look like your typical christmas tree shape with a fat bottom area that tapers to the pointed tip. The purple monster-like corals are probably thick acropora loripes or austera. The like imposters do come from Fiji and Solomons, but I have yet to see the real purple monster morph of A. valida imported since 1995. I have never seen the true exotic morph come in from Fiji. The name of Purple Monster was coined by Steve Shvetstoff who lives in the San Francisco Bay Area. Originally I thought a good common name would have been the Christmas Tree Coral since that describes the rare form. This name was already used by another coral and the phrase Purple Monster became the popular name. The League of Coral Farmers and DE are not farming the real monster simply due to its slow growth rate and lack of fragments. We will try to bank this particular species for future farming potential.

[SueT]

Ninong, you beat me to my generalized statement that Tyree's PM has only white polyps and due to such slow growth it is not available. There are a few people growing PM or should I say waiting for it to grow.

I will say IMO, the first pic seems to me to be montipora monasteriata, while sometimes available it is a nice coral. Page 89 of Veron's Corals Of The World.
The next seems to be montipora aequituberculata. Page 76-77 of same book. I have had this montipora vefore and this looks to be very close to what I had.
The acropora, while not PM, I am still working on what I think it may be.
The last acropora may be acropora nana. Or one of the similar species with elongated corallite.

[Dazureus]

Thanks to you both for the quick replies. I forgot to mention that I read that page about the Purple monster, but thanks for referencing it. It's a nice piece, and it also tells me to be cautious about information from an otherwise trustworthy LFS. He might not always know what he's getting. I have to get a copy of that Veron series. Seems invaluable. Thanks again.