Oceans, Reefs and Aquariums is adding another notch to their bedpost, err aquarium stand, with the release of their latest coral, the ORA Confusa. Not to be confused with the Montipora spongodes, a coral that ORA has been circulating through the hobby for quite a while now, this new monti sports a deep green base and a bright pink rim. We aren’t sure of the price point these corals will likely come in at, but they should be showing up at your local fish store within a matter of days. As far as frag sizes go, if they are anything like the ORA Spongodes frags, they will certainly be generously sized and come attached to large frag disks instead of plugs.

Keep reading below to see the differences and similarities between M. confusa and M. spongodes.

While M. confusa and M. spongodes are generally very similar in appearance, it is important to note the differences and similarities between these two species as they are often mistaken for each other. Both corals have rust colored polyps, a green base color, and even similar growth forms. But it’s the little things that set these two apart. The M. confusa has a rich pink growing edge, pitted corallites, and grows in more of a plate-like appearance, though it will occasionally form vertical growths. The M. spongodes, on the other hand, has significant more vertical growth and shallower corallites. Again, very subtle differences but enough to set these two species apart.

Here’s a little distraction from your Sunday night football games. Coral restoration and conservation is a huge passion of ours, and should be of every saltwater aquarium keeper, so it should come as no surprise that we’re plugging the Coral Restoration Foundation (CRF). In the video above, the guys at EcoTech Marine are also joining in on the conservation efforts by going out on a little coral planting trip to Molasses Reef in the Florida Keys. They spend the day fragging and transplanting up to 60 of the highly endangered Elkhorn (Acropora palmata) and Staghorn corals (A. cervicornis).

We highly applaud these efforts and encourage everyone to look into the Coral Restoration Foundation to see how they can help. They focus primarily on Elkhorn and Staghorn restoration, but their efforts aren’t limited to just those.

We typically like to focus on rare and beautiful aquarium livestock when we post the AquaNerd Picture of the Week, but this time we wanted to do something just a little different. The focus of this week’s photo is an orange Montipora coral that obviously started out as a small frag and has since grown out, taking on a very unnatural appearance as it grew to the shape of the square frag plug. Most of the corals that are grown out from frags take on this appearance, and it’s very unsightly in our opinions. To avoid these shapes we suggest that you use more natural looking frag plugs, such as a piece of live rock rubble or an artificial plug that is designed to blend in with your reef.

We recently received a sample bottle of the fairly new Coral Glue from EcoTech Marine’s Elements line, so we decided to take it for a spin and cut up some corals. The bottle we got was a 30ml sample, a good size for the casual fragging hobbyist in my opinion and one that should be sold to the general public, and the glue itself has a very thick consistency that is easily applied to the frag plugs. The corals stick to the plugs with ease, staying upright for the most part. The cyanoacrylate based Coral Glue cures extremely quickly and it didn’t appear to leave behind that floating glue residue on the water’s surface that other glues slough off. To make our experience even better, the polyps on our newly cut and glued frags were coming out as soon as they hit the water.

And to top if off, I didn’t get any glue on my fingers. Usually, whenever I frag corals I always get a little glue on the hands. This is mostly due to the cheap squeeze tube leaking and runny applicators making a mess, but the Coral Glue’s bottle kept our fingers completely glue-free.

ORA is set to release another aquacultured coral onto the aquarium market. Called the Grube’s Gorgonian, this isn’t the most colorful offering from ORA, but it is certainly one with some of the longest history. Originally collected in the Philippines way back in 1990, this octocoral spread all over Europe and eventually landed in the hands of aquarium expert Julian Sprung. ORA acquired the coral, and a few others, from Julian after he decided to break down the aquarium in his office. As with any of the corals that land in the aquariums of the Flordia-based aquaculturists, the Grube’s Gorgonian was grown out and propagated, and consumers will have access to 2″ long frags attached to the signature ORA black frag plugs.

The official announcement from ORA:

Description: ORA is proud to offer a new soft coral from our collection, Grube’s Gorgonian (Pinnigorgia flava). Grube’s (pronounced Grooba’s) Gorgonian is a graceful, thin-branched octocoral that can be described as tan to pink in color with similarly colored polyps. We obtained this coral from Julian Sprung and we’ve been stunned by its hardiness and rapid growth. It has an extensive history in the Aquarium Hobby which Julian was glad to share with us:

“It was originally collected in the Philippines around 1990 by Klaus and Rosalia Grube. From their aquarium in Berlin it has spread all over Europe. So many people have it but don’t know where it came from. I got my colony from the Grubes and grew it for several years into a big bush. I gave a cutting to Peter Wilkens, who took it back to Switzerland and grew it at Wiwi Aquaria. He gave a cutting to Jean Jacques Eckert in France, who still cultivates it in his aquarium. I lost my original colony suddenly about 12 years ago, but was able to get a new cutting from Jean Jacques Eckert during a visit with him for a Récif France conference. I’ve been careful to maintain it now in several tanks. For me this coral is always a reminder of my visit to Berlin where I met Dietrich Stüber and the many wonderful hobbyists there, including Klaus and Rose Grube.”

Many thanks to Julian for introducing this cool gorgonian to the US market and helping us appreciate its extensive history! Frags will be approximately 2 inches and will come attached to a black plastic plug.

Flow: Moderate

Placement: All Levels

Lighting: Low – High
Flow: Moderate

Pictured in this week’s installment of the AquaNerd Picture of the Week is an ORA Blue Cespitularia coral seen in the circular Zero Edge aquarium at MACNA. This gorgeous soft coral isn’t a recent addition to ORA’s lineup by any means, but it’s still one we see very little of at the local aquarium stores unfortunately and we’re not exactly sure why. It’s obviously very attractive and it grows relatively quickly under reasonable water conditions, and it’s not all that expensive. Regardless, we’ve only seen a handful of these locally and seeing as how beautiful it is, we want more. Also pictured is the fairly new ORA Sprung’s Stunner chalice coral seen on the right-hand side of the photo.

Aquarium events are all the rage, and the Reef-A-Palooza event sponsored by the Southern California Marine Aquarium Society (SCMAS) is one of the larger ones to takes place each and every year. Despite all of the vendors clamoring for booth space, the event organizers are still keeping the show true to the aquarium hobby by allowing hobbyists to purchase booths to sell their locally grown corals. The booths will be available for $125 per hobbyist, with a single table able to be shared among at least two hobbyists. The hobbyists can setup two separate 2-foot long frag tanks or a single 4-foot long aquarium to be shared amongst the aquarium keepers. Of course, the invitation by the club is aimed at non-commercial hobbyists who don’t have a website to sell their corals, but still need a public venue to unload some aquacultured pieces. To sign up, all the hobbyists have to do is complete a registration form and the final selection will be made in early October. Members of SCMAS will have a higher priority, and only 6 to 8 booths will be available.

Coral Publications recently shared this great up close video of the larvae of a Pocillopora damicornis coral swimming around in a small dish a few hours after sunset in one of two in an experimental coral nurseries. The larvae, which look more like a pest flatworm than the offspring of a coral, is released by the adult coral and swim around until they find a suitable spot. Once this spot is found, the larvae settle in and change into the calcium secreting polyps we see in adult corals. Unlike most scleractinian corals that release either eggs, sperm or both, the eggs of the P. damicornis are fertilized internally and the larvae exit the mouth of the polyp. This form of reproduction makes the Pocillopora very suitable for aquarium use, though many aquarium keepers stay away from it because it will sprout all over the place.

Ever wonder what a full grown ORA frag would look like? Well, ORA released a series of growth shots on their blog yesterday detailing the plating growth that their Red Planet Acro takes on as it matures. ORA first acquired this coral in May of 2006, with the first photograph below being from September of that same year. The coral currently resides in one of their large greenhouse aquariums, where it has been allowed to grow out naturally. This massive Red Planet colony is one of the largest colonies in ORA’s possession and one of the largest we’ve seen in captivity, but the coral aquaculture gurus have run into accidental breakages and few areas that died off from being shaded by upper layers of the coral throughout the years.

See the chronological growth sequence below. The first picture was taken September 2006 and the last was taken in July of this year. In the roughly 5-year time frame, the coral has grown from a small mini colony to being almost three feet across!

Only a couple of days ago, ORA revealed their latest coral, the vibrantly colored Kelly Green Psammocora. While most of their corals usually take a couple of weeks to trickle onto the local scene, this one showed up only days after it became available in the aquarium trade and it is likely one of the first in the Houston area. As can be seen in the image above, this new Psammocora is absolutely glowing, and this shade of green is brighter than any other green coral we’ve seen. Even though green corals are so abundant in the aquarium hobby and we try to avoid putting them into our aquariums, this coral is certainly one we could make an exception for. The price for this new radioactive Psammocora is set somewhere between $36 and $40 depending on the store, and as with all ORA frags they are quite sizable.

Special thanks to Keith at Super Pet World for letting us come by and snap off some photos of this new ORA frag. We also got a good look at the new ORA Sprung’s Stunner chalice, which can be seen below.