baby coral?

ileolai · Jan 14, 2026

found this thing on the underside of a rock i flipped over when rescaping the tank. some kind of baby coral? it's smaller than my pinky nail. i have mushrooms and leathers in the tank.

ileolai · Jan 14, 2026

top view. please tell me it's not a baby majano

rayadog · Jan 14, 2026

It honestly doesn’t scream majano to me. But it would have to be a mushroom if it was one of your others. From the same order as mushrooms… But it kinda looks like Paracorynactis hoplite; which I don’t think would track. You usually find ball anemones/Corynactis (not paracorynactis) anemones under rocks and such like that. So I don’t think that’d be a stretch. Honestly it’s so tiny every time I look at it, it looks like something else

but I guess I’d have to place my bets on ball anemone

dedragon · Jan 14, 2026

any plate corals in the tank? cud have dropped a bud

rayadog · Jan 14, 2026

dedragon said:
any plate corals in the tank? cud have dropped a bud

This was the first thing I thought too but figured there weren’t

ileolai · Jan 14, 2026

dedragon said:
any plate corals in the tank? cud have dropped a bud

nope. i have leathers, mushrooms and some clove polyps. i had an elegance in there for like a week, but i took it out because one of my fish kept harassing it. tank is 2-3 years old and i havent introduced any new live rock or anything recently

eta: could a baby elegance coral have popped up from the bits of elegance coral my fish was throwing around the tank? that would be wild

ileolai · Jan 14, 2026

rayadog said:
It honestly doesn’t scream majano to me. But it would have to be a mushroom if it was one of your others. From the same order as mushrooms… But it kinda looks like Paracorynactis hoplite; which I don’t think would track. You usually find ball anemones/Corynactis (not paracorynactis) anemones under rocks and such like that. So I don’t think that’d be a stretch. Honestly it’s so tiny every time I look at it, it looks like something else but I guess I’d have to place my bets on ball anemone

i think ball anemone might be it. the white thing in the center seems to be a mouth. the way the rock was turned over it would have been completely shaded, so i was suprised to find anything coral-like growing there.

Tahoe61 · Jan 14, 2026

Does it have a skeleton?
Did you use live rock, if so what was the source?

ileolai · Jan 14, 2026

Tahoe61 said:
Does it have a skeleton?
Did you use live rock, if so what was the source?

its like 5mm by 5mm across so i can't tell. it has some kind of foot. excuse my photobombing stripey

i used live rock to establish the tank, it's Australian live rock

bradleym · Jan 14, 2026

It’s definitely not like any majano I’ve ever seen, and I’ve seen several. My bet is baby coral of some kind. If it relocates to a different spot on the rock that will determine coral vs. anemone.

Tikki · Jan 14, 2026

Feed it and see what happens

Tahoe61 · Jan 14, 2026

ileolai said:
its like 5mm by 5mm across so i can't tell. it has some kind of foot. excuse my photobombing stripey

i used live rock to establish the tank, it's Australian live rock

It looks like an LPS, but you will know for sure if you blow some water at it and it closes up to show a column versus a stoney skeleton. Calling in the expert.

@thamnasteroid

thamnasteroid · Jan 14, 2026

Would need a better photo to tell, don't zoom in but bring both your phone and the rock as close to the glass as possible

ileolai · Jan 15, 2026

thamnasteroid said:
Would need a better photo to tell, don't zoom in but bring both your phone and the rock as close to the glass as possible

best i can do with my phone camera. my dslr is buried in the garage somewhere. i can try and dig it up tomorrow if needed.

ileolai · Jan 15, 2026

Tahoe61 said:
It looks like an LPS, but you will know for sure if you blow some water at it and it closes up to show a column versus a stoney skeleton. Calling in the expert.

@thamnasteroid

i blew some water at it because i thought the white thing might have been sand stuck on it, before realizing that was its mouth. it didn't really react much

ileolai · Jan 15, 2026

Tikki said:
Feed it and see what happens

great idea

it extended purple feeder tentacles and sucked the food into its mouth. it looked like it could turn its mouth towards the food to pick it up. it didn't fold itself into a ball the way a mushroom coral does.

Tikki · Jan 15, 2026

ileolai said:
Tikki said:

Feed it and see what happens

Click to expand...

great idea

it extended purple feeder tentacles and sucked the food into its mouth. it looked like it could turn its mouth towards the food to pick it up. it didn't fold itself into a ball the way a mushroom coral does.