Color Changing Coral

[PeterIMA]

Have anyone ever observed or recorded corals that can temporally change
their colour?

Recently I have been observing a green coral that can temporarily change to
red within a second. The extended tentacles are originally green in daytime,
making the colonies green. When the corals were touched, the tentacles
retracted and revealed the red outer layer, then the whole colonies appears
to be red. I guess there are some advantages associated with this colour
change: better protection with red colour when it is stimulated. Also, it
may be good to be green at daytime when the tentacles are extended, and be
red (or appeared to be dark) at night when the tentacles are retracted.

I am very curious whether other people have noticed this kind of coral.
Anyone might also contact me for further information.

Terry Ng
[email protected]

 

[Anonymous]

Try posting that in a coral forum Peter.

BTW, that's nothing new, did a scientist just discover this :lol: Feeding tentacles closing to reveal a different colorred flesh is nothing new, or amazing, to those that have been keepin coral for years, and have no PHD or such

 

[PeterIMA]

Gresham, I suggest that you email the scientist who just discovered it.

Peter

 

[PeterIMA]

Subj: Re: [Coral-List] Temporal colour change of coral from green to red
Date: 7/6/2006 8:57:54 PM Eastern Standard Time
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Received from Internet: click here for more information



Hi Terry and all,

Very interesting observation!

Not counting the brownish hue provided by zooxanthellae pigments, there
are four basic colors: fluorescent green, red and cyan (this one is kind
of bluish, looks gray underwater), plus intense non-fluorescent purple
that may look dark blue underwater (most common in Portitidae,
Acroporidae and Pocilloporidae). Oftentimes you would have differently
colored domains such as oral disk, caenosarc and tentacles (Faviidae),
or caenosarc, tentacles and the rim of the corallite (Acroporidae).
Purples tend to be located on colony extremities - branch tips or
growing edges (this seem to apply to some extent to reds as well). So it
is quite natural that when the tentacles are colored differently than
caenosarc the appearance would change when the tentacles are retracted;
however, I must admit that I never encountered a coral in which the
effect would be really as pronounced as it seems to be from Terry's
message (what was that coral, Terry?..). Changes in the coloration of
the domains throughout the lifetime of a colony seem to happen extremely
slowly if happening at all (with the exception of cases when damaged
zone starts regenerating and expressing reds or purples that were not
there before; after regeneration the zone settles back to the appearance
of the surrounding undamaged polyps); but admittedly we need to look
into that more accurately.

cheers

Misha

 

[Anonymous]

LIke the scientist in Mexico that discovorred what fishmen have known since the dawn of fishing?

Peter, not being a reefkeeper yourself, you wouldn't have the expeirence of seeing this, which many of us real reef keepers have seen countless times. Get on a plane, and come see it in my tank. Nothing new, except to Terry :lol: Yup, since no one has written a paper and published it, it's not true :roll:

 

[dizzy]

Gresham,
What type of coral are you talking about?

 

[Anonymous]

Quite a few actually Mitch. I've got a porites that is blue/red when open, and greenish silver when closed. many goniopora can change like that as well, even more drasticly at times. I've seen ones go from red when open, to blue when closed. I have some m. digitatas that when are open are either green, blue or red. When closed, the green,turn to red due to the flesh color being red. When closed, blue turns to red (again, due to flesh color) and when the green one is closed, it turns blue. Polyp color and different flesh color, are common in corals. There's no real color change, just simply the closing of a polyp. Heck I have blue eyes, when open, but flesh tone when closed :lol:

 

[Anonymous]

But really, how does this pertain to this forum? This is a thread for the GR forum, or collectors forum, but not IBTH.

There's been a spat of these COral list threads recently, all stuff many of us have seen and honestly don't need to see on this forum. Peter, go topside, check out the rest of the sight :lol:

 

[PeterIMA]

Gresham, I think you are right that this topic does not need to be discussed under the Industry Behind the Hobby. I suggest however that you or some other marine hobbyists need to get onto the Coral Reef List Server and provide feedback to the scientists (who seem to think color changing corals is new stuff).
I only posted this to get some exchanges going between the scientific community, the trade, and marine hobbyists
Peter

 

[Anonymous]

Peter, there's tons of hobbyists on the list, I've been on it for a few years now. I share the same last name as the moderator in fact :lol:

 

[Anonymous]

Gresham, I think you are right that this topic does not need to be discussed under the Industry Behind the Hobby. I suggest however that you or some other marine hobbyists need to get onto the Coral Reef List Server and provide feedback to the scientists (who seem to think color changing corals is new stuff).
I only posted this to get some exchanges going between the scientific community, the trade, and marine hobbyists
Peter

mebbe the scientists need to get out of their ignorance fostering lab cubicles and familiarize themselves with the BASIC properties of the very animals they claim to be qualified to research

seems they need to be here, more than we need to be there


:roll: