Zoa ID please :)

Anthony Epifano · Feb 17, 2023

Hey all!

Need some help IDing a zoa I picked up at my local fish store. It caught my eye in the misc section for 29.99. It has a decent amount of heads on it too! Let me know what you think!

PS: I don’t really care about names, but curious to hear what you think. I’ve been reefing for 15 years now and the names have gotten out of control!

FreshSaltH2o · Feb 17, 2023

Looks like Hawaiian agaves ding dangs possibly

Anthony Epifano · Feb 17, 2023

Thank you!!

Reefing.with.Rich · Feb 17, 2023

Anthony Epifano said:
Hey all!

Need some help IDing a zoa I picked up at my local fish store. It caught my eye in the misc section for 29.99. It has a decent amount of heads on it too! Let me know what you think!

PS: I don’t really care about names, but curious to hear what you think. I’ve been reefing for 15 years now and the names have gotten out of control!

Hawaiian people eaters

Tired · Feb 17, 2023

For future reference, many zoas and palys are toxic, so you shouldn't really be handling them with your bare hands. Particularly not any of the larger ones, as the especially nasty ones tend to be larger. Nothing to worry about as long as you take the same basic precautions that should be applied to anything involved in a reef tank (to avoid bacterial infections), but not something you want on your skin, just in case.

They're Hawaiian somethings. They should get to a decent size per polyp, and may spread at a fairly high rate, so put 'em somewhere you want a nice big patch.

Kasrift · Feb 17, 2023

FreshSaltH2o said:
Looks like Hawaiian agaves ding dangs possibly

@FreshSaltH2o is pretty on the money with zoa identification. The ding dangs though don't have that high of a pink look to them. I do 100% agree they are Hawaiian though. AquaSD was selling some in the past as Pink Galaxy zoas, and I grabbed some. Here is their photo of them https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/1496/0344/products/PinkGalaxyPalys-_50_720x.png?v=1668908352 Also while looking up other names for it, I came across people in the UK selling them as Yellow Mambas for some reason.

FreshSaltH2o · Feb 17, 2023

Kasrift said:
@FreshSaltH2o is pretty on the money with zoa identification. The ding dangs though don't have that high of a pink look to them. I do 100% agree they are Hawaiian though. AquaSD was selling some in the past as Pink Galaxy zoas, and I grabbed some. Here is their photo of them https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/1496/0344/products/PinkGalaxyPalys-_50_720x.png?v=1668908352 Also while looking up other names for it, I came across people in the UK selling them as Yellow Mambas for some reason.

So may variations of this zoa all of them are nice. Agreed it definitely has more pinkish hues.

Anthony Epifano · Feb 18, 2023

Tired said:
For future reference, many zoas and palys are toxic, so you shouldn't really be handling them with your bare hands. Particularly not any of the larger ones, as the especially nasty ones tend to be larger. Nothing to worry about as long as you take the same basic precautions that should be applied to anything involved in a reef tank (to avoid bacterial infections), but not something you want on your skin, just in case.

They're Hawaiian somethings. They should get to a decent size per polyp, and may spread at a fairly high rate, so put 'em somewhere you want a nice big patch.

I should wear gloves when I handle these, but my hands didn’t have any open cuts and I avoid grabbing them by the heads but I better be safe than sorry as my mother would tell me.