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Smart reefing: Which type of brain coral do you prefer?
There are so many different types of brain corals and just figuring out how to pronounce the names requires some “smarts” let alone trying to differentiate all the genus that fall under the Mussidae and Merulinidae families of corals. The good news is that many of the common groups of brain corals that we know are also their assigned genus (or shorted versions of the genus) such as Trachophyllia, Lobophyllia, Favia, Favites, Symphyllia, Platygyra, Cyphastrea, Wellsophyllia (note: the Wellso is now grouped as a Trachy) and many more. Do you have a favorite type of brain coral? Maybe it is one that isn’t even on this list! Let us know your thoughts about brain corals in the related discussion thread.
Photo by @uniquecorals
To add a layer of complexity to the naming, there are some groupings of corals that fall under other genus such as the Micromussa Lords (formerly known as an Acan Lord) that are are in the family Lobophylliidae. With the recent changes in genus names related to brain corals, sometimes keeping all the details of brain corals straight can hurt my brain! In fact, I may still not have it right - feel free to jump in a provide corrections.
Want to explore brain corals a little more? Please check out the following R2R articles:
[Edited to correct the spelling of Trachyphyllia and how the Lords are classified; see thread below for other corrections and related discussion. Thanks for the input!]
There are so many different types of brain corals and just figuring out how to pronounce the names requires some “smarts” let alone trying to differentiate all the genus that fall under the Mussidae and Merulinidae families of corals. The good news is that many of the common groups of brain corals that we know are also their assigned genus (or shorted versions of the genus) such as Trachophyllia, Lobophyllia, Favia, Favites, Symphyllia, Platygyra, Cyphastrea, Wellsophyllia (note: the Wellso is now grouped as a Trachy) and many more. Do you have a favorite type of brain coral? Maybe it is one that isn’t even on this list! Let us know your thoughts about brain corals in the related discussion thread.
Photo by @uniquecorals
To add a layer of complexity to the naming, there are some groupings of corals that fall under other genus such as the Micromussa Lords (formerly known as an Acan Lord) that are are in the family Lobophylliidae. With the recent changes in genus names related to brain corals, sometimes keeping all the details of brain corals straight can hurt my brain! In fact, I may still not have it right - feel free to jump in a provide corrections.
Want to explore brain corals a little more? Please check out the following R2R articles:
[Edited to correct the spelling of Trachyphyllia and how the Lords are classified; see thread below for other corrections and related discussion. Thanks for the input!]
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