Acan Corals (Micromussa): Care, Feeding and WYSIWYG Acans for Sale

Acans are the coral that taught LPS keepers to feed. Thick fleshy polyps packed side by side, each with a visible central mouth and concentric rings of color running out from it — and flesh meaty enough that the skeleton disappears entirely when the colony is inflated. The trade still calls them acans; the animal is Micromussa lordhowensis, reclassified from Acanthastrea, and our listings use both names so nobody is confused.

Care at a glance

Feed them — they will pay you back

Acans take food readily and grow measurably faster when fed, which is unusual enough among LPS to be worth exploiting. Meaty food a couple of evenings a week, placed on the polyps after the lights dim, and a frag becomes a colony on a schedule you can watch. The technique, portion sizes and what to feed: Spot feeding corals.

Keep them low. Under strong light the colors compress and the flesh tightens; on the sand or the bottom third of the rock they inflate to full size and the rings show the way they do in our photos.

Acans in stock now

One thing to know before you order: shipping and packing are charged by the box, not by the coral. A box holds several corals for the same $15 packing fee and the same overnight ride, Florida orders under 6 lb ship overnight for a flat $30, and orders over $399 ship free. If this page puts one coral on your list, it is worth seeing what else belongs in the box — start with corals under $100 or the newest WYSIWYG pieces.

Every stony coral we sell is aquacultured at the shop in Key West under Florida Aquaculture Certificate #AQ0254072, and the photo on a WYSIWYG listing is the exact animal that ships. Corals ship UPS Overnight every Tuesday and Wednesday. If you are ever in Key West, come see the raceways.