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Vibrant, Healthy and Gorgeous Online Acanthophyllia LPS Corals

Acanthophyllia is one of the larger species of LPS coral and is a hardy, colorful and really interesting addition to just about any coral display in your home or business. Native to the Indo-Pacific region, these carnivorous corals are also called several other names, including meat corals, button corals, doughnut corals, tooth corals and others. These common names describe the shape and niche of these corals fairly well, as they are meat-eating, round and the septa that are formed on the stony base of these corals resemble teeth. Hopefully, you’ll seldom see the septa of your Acanthophyllia except when acclimating your new Acanthophyllia coral frag, as if you can see them, that means that mantle of this beautiful coral has retracted due to shipping, stress from improper lighting and/or flow, overfeeding, improper placement or lousy water quality. A healthy Acanthophyllia will have lush, colorful and turgid tissue that overlaps the stony base it builds as the coral grows.

Acanthophyllia Coral Care Guide

Experience Level

We don’t recommend our online Acanthophyllia polyps for beginners, as they are easily injured and somewhat aggressive. That said, if you have a fully cycled and mature coral system with stable water quality parameters and healthy fish and corals, Acanthophyllia meat corals can be a good addition if you follow our care guide.

Optimal Water Quality Parameters

  • Temperature: 72-78F, 22-25C
  • pH: 8.1-8.3
  • dKH: 7-11 (125-200ppm CaCO3 equivalent)
  • Calcium: 375-450ppm
  • Magnesium: 1275-1350ppm
  • Salinity: 35ppt
  • Ammonia (NH3): less than 0.1ppm
  • Nitrite (NO2): less than 0.2ppm
  • Nitrate (NO3): less than 0.2ppm
  • Phosphates (PO4): less than 0.03ppm

Lighting Preferences:

Acanthophyllia does host photosynthetic, symbiotic zooxanthellae in their tissue, which provide glucose and other nutrients essential for the health of the coral but will not tolerate higher light levels for very long. Initially, place your polyp in the lower part of the water column and monitor the color and posture of the tissue carefully. It may take several days for your new Acanthophyllia to adjust to the lighting, flow and water chemistry of your system, so patience is key to making sure that it has fully adjusted to current conditions before you consider moving it to another location. If you develop a reefkeeper’s patience, then you will have a much better intuition about proper placement, identifying stressed corals early and build confidence in your skills as a coralhead.

Water Flow Preferences:

You’ll want to choose a spot for your Acanthophyllia that is sheltered from direct flows and is only exposed to low, shifting flow from your inflows and powerheads. If exposed to flow that is too strong, the aforementioned septa can erode the tissue on the underside of the polyp and cause it to shrink, exposing the margins of the stony base. This is problematic for a couple reasons: One, it will drastically shrink the amount of surface area available to your zooxanthellae and Two, your polyp will be too shrunken to deploy its feeding tentacles.

Placement Considerations:

Depending on your lighting and the depth of your display, it’s probably best to choose a spot in the lower half of your reef tank in between chunks of live rock and away from clams and your other corals. At night, your Acanthophyllia may sting and partially digest the tissue on its neighbors, so leave some space around it. If you move it later to a different spot for better lighting and protection from flows, closely monitor the tissue on anything nearby for loss of color, retraction, etc. These could indicate nocturnal stinging from your meat coral.

Feeding Considerations:

Despite the large opening in the center of your Acanthophyllia when it is fully dilated, resist the temptation to feed it chunks of fish, clam, shrimp, etc. that are too large for it to digest. We recommend feeding much smaller amounts of finally minced portions of these foods, along with brine, mysis, and other small protein. Too much or too large portions of food too quickly can be difficult for your coral polyp to digest, causing it to start decomposing inside the polyp. This can kill the polyp or result in a stressed coral that can take months to fully recover. At night, the feeding tentacles on a healthy Acanthophyllia should naturally deploy and the center of the polyp will dilate just as it would on a coral reef. To trigger this response during the day, try the standard method of gently squirting thawed food juice over or upstream of your coral and wait for the response. However, Acanthophyllia feed slowly, so make sure that opportunistic fish, shrimp, crabs and other thieves don’t steal the food before the polyp can ingest it!

Acanthophyllia LPS Corals For Sale Online from CoralFrags.com!

If you’ve been thinking about adding an Acanthophyllia to your display and want a clean, healthy specimen which will delight the eye, flatter your reef tank and be the envy of your reefing friends, please browse our collection and buy with confidence. We have built a reputation for providing pest-free, healthy and hardy corals one satisfied client at a time and take our responsibilities to our clients very seriously. We can’t be successful unless our customers are happy, so we go above and beyond to ensure that we provide the best online coral frags for the best prices. Thanks very much for browsing our selection and buy with confidence. Happy Reefkeeping!

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