Montastrea cavernosa
Montastrea cavernosais a colonial coral with bulbous corallites.Montastreais easy to spot on most Caribbean reefs making it a good place to start when learning to identify corals. This coral can be a solid color or have contrasting colored corallites, which makes it exciting to find on a dive.
Montastreagrows into massive colonies which can be flat or domed shape. This is a hardy coral which can grow in most reef habitats. You can find colonies ofMontastreain the shallowest part of the reef and it is possible to see this coral while snorkeling.
During the day the coral polyps are retracted inside the corallite and, at night the polyps emerge to consume any food drifting in the current.
If you go scuba diving at night, worms, plankton, and other marine invertebrates often flock to your dive light. If you shine your light near the open polyps chances are the coral will quickly snatch up the meal.
Great Star Coral
The common name forMontastrea cavernosais the Great Star Coral. If you remember our articles aboutOrbicellacoral你可能会注意到一些两者之间的相似之处species. Until recentlyOrbicellawas classified underMontastreaand older reference books and some online resources still classifyOrbicellaasMontastrea.
最大的区别之一tween these two corals is the corallite size.Montastreacorallites can be a few centimeters or an inch across where asOrbicellacorallites are less than 1cm across.
Colonies ofMontastreacan grow into towering colonies several meters across. Or they can encrusting along the ocean floor like the three colonies above.
TheCoral Diariesseries is a list of corals we have seen while diving around the world. We’ve created this series so that you can learn more about corals, and how to identify them on the reef. We encourage you to send us your coral pictures and leave a comment in the section below to learn more about the interesting species you’ve found while diving.