Does not look aiptasia like but I have no clue what this little fella might be. Can you help?

[MikeCRK]

Hi,

With the New Year (Happy New Year!) I found some unexpected guest on one of my zoa frags. It looks like fat SPS polyp, it is orange, does glow a little in UV and does not look like aiptasia. Does not bother the zoas and I have no idea what this could be. Can you help?

It is tiny, maybe two mm max and in the centre of the tank, so really hard to take a photo - sorry! It does look a bit like tiny sun coral (which I never had).

It sits there at the bottom on epoxy putty.

 

[TX_REEF]

Hi,

With the New Year (Happy New Year!) I found some unexpected guest on one of my zoa frags. It looks like fat SPS polyp, it is orange, does glow a little in UV and does not look like aiptasia. Does not bother the zoas and I have no idea what this could be. Can you help?

It is tiny, maybe two mm max and in the centre of the tank, so really hard to take a photo - sorry! It does look a bit like tiny sun coral (which I never had).

It sits there at the bottom on epoxy putty.

They look like zoas or palys to me

 

[MikeCRK]

They look like zoas or palys to me

the frag is with zoa, this little yellow guy at the bottom is a mystery and nothing like zoa or paly.

it does look similar to:

but I never had sun corals

 

[MikeCRK]

OK, I think I managed to get a tiny better photo of it. It is growing, any ideas?
It is not paly nor zoa.

 

[FMF0331]

100 % not Aptasia ..
Leaning towards sun coral or dendro

 

[Mr_Knightley]

Could very well be a sun coral settler; they are known to spawn in captivity on occasion, so it may be that the tank you got this frag from had an event shortly before you picked it up. Super cool find.