Grown Coral Guide?

[TeeSquared1214]

I’m not sure if this exists somewhere in the forum or how other people have learned this but I’m having a harder time picking it up. How do people know what a coral will look like when more grown out?

Being new to the hobby I find a lot of coral that look really good, and that my tank can meet their requirements for. But since they are all frags/polyps/heads and often small, I have no idea how big something will get, if it’s encrusting or not, if it branches etc.

I’m just curious how to determine the overall structure a coral will eventually take so I can place it in a way to prepare for that.

I’m going for a mixed reef, mainly softies and LPS, with one or two SPS (preferably either plating/shelf type, brain coral, or acros).

Finding grown coral pictures online is harder than I thought it would be since most are of them on frag plugs/for sale.

What do others do? Do you either know what you’re getting and where it’s going and how it’ll end up looking or do you just YOLO it and full send?

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

My thought process is that we select corals based on appearance, and then we research everything about it to know if its suitable for our tank. So we should have a fairly good idea of what the colony will look like when it grows out before buying.

Are buying and then researching? Can you post an example of what coral is hard to find a colony pic online?

Sorry if I misunderstand your question

 

[TeeSquared1214]

My thought process is that we select corals based on appearance, and then we research everything about it to know if its suitable for our tank. So we should have a fairly good idea of what the colony will look like when it grows out before buying.

Are buying and then researching? Can you post an example of what coral is hard to find a colony pic online?

Sorry if I misunderstand your question

Thanks for responding.

Just not sure what to really search for when looking up corals. Maybe I’m not looking/researching hard enough? I didn’t include the term colony so that could likely be the reason why. Often I think of the coral fully grown as still a single coral, but with multiple polyps/heads. I don’t buy unless I understand what it will look like and what the care requirements are.

I guess I just wasn’t sure if there was a comprehensive guide or resource for me to reference similar to the hitchhiker guide often posted in this forum.

Some things like chalices, different types of montipora, various leathers are what comes to mind.

 

[aminals]

Just search ""coral name" colony" or ""coral name" grow out thread" I get what you mean. It's not that hard to figure out but some variants grow different like all the different acropora. Or some fancy montipora without colony photos cant tell if it'll encrust only or branch out some. Or the colors of chalices that seem to be 1 of.