Help me ID this growth on my Fox Flame colony please!

[jessezm]

Hey all. This Fox Flame colony that I've had for a couple years now developed this white bulbous growth on part of it's underside, and it now appears to be accelerating and doing damage to the colony. It appears as if its calcareous and potentially altered coral skeleton, like some tumor that's causing it to grow and causing the tissue to die? Though it doesn't seem to grow much algae on it like you'd expect a dead coral to do. Does anyone know what it is or what I should do about it?

 

[scvc620]

Bump....following

 

[Alexopora]

Hey all. This Fox Flame colony that I've had for a couple years now developed this white bulbous growth on part of it's underside, and it now appears to be accelerating and doing damage to the colony. It appears as if its calcareous and potentially altered coral skeleton, like some tumor that's causing it to grow and causing the tissue to die? Though it doesn't seem to grow much algae on it like you'd expect a dead coral to do. Does anyone know what it is or what I should do about it?

Following this thread as this is absolutely new to me. I guess a possible solution for now is to frag the healthy/unaffected parts and throw away the affected sections.

 

[jessezm]

That's what I was thinking. I also considered applying putty or glue over the affected area, but it almost looks as if the "infection" is internal, and could pop up somewhere else. But again, I have no idea. I'd love to get some sort of answer from someone who's seen this before acting, but I won't wait too much longer, as this Fox Flame colony has really nice color and I don't want to lose it!

 

[TX_Punisher]

I wouldn’t want that spreading. I’d frag the best pieces well above the infected areas and dump the rest in the circular file.

 

[sculpin01]

Possibly a coral growth anomaly. See attached link:

Growth Anomalies on the Coral Genera Acropora and Porites Are Strongly Associated with Host Density and Human Population Size across the Indo-Pacific

Growth anomalies (GAs) are common, tumor-like diseases that can cause significant morbidity and decreased fecundity in the major Indo-Pacific reef-building coral genera, Acropora and Porites. GAs are unusually tractable for testing hypotheses about drivers of coral disease because of their...

journals.plos.org

 

[jessezm]

Very similar to their pictures and description. This is helpful, thanks.

mill try to excise the effected area and hopefully it won’t come back