An Acanthophyllia is an expensive single polyp that you will buy from a photograph. Here is how to read that photograph so a damaged or bleached piece does not end up on your sand bed.
Acanthophyllia deshayesiana, the meat coral, is one polyp on one heavy skeleton. Inflated, it is a smooth, fleshy dome 4 to 8 inches across, often with a translucent, almost glassy mantle in red, green, orange, or a mix, and a single mouth in the center. It comes from deeper, calmer water and lives on soft bottom. Nothing about it is fast: it grows slowly, recovers slowly, and shows damage plainly. That last part is the good news, because it means you can check most of what matters before you spend the money.
What to check when buying Acanthophyllia online
- Ask for, or find, a photo under white light. Blue light hides two things you need to see: pale zones and exposed skeleton. Under white light a healthy meat coral is saturated edge to edge. A bleached one has washed-out or see-through patches that do not match the rest of the mantle. If the listing only shows a blue photo, that alone is not a red flag, but it means you have not inspected the coral yet.
- Look for white at the rim. The mantle should wrap over the edge of the skeleton so no bare skeleton shows. A thin white ring around the outside, or ridges (septa) showing through where tissue has thinned, is tissue recession. Recession that has reached the mouth is the version that usually does not turn around.
- Find the mouth. It should be one closed slit near the center. A gaping mouth with the inside visible, a torn mouth, or tissue pulling back from it are the injuries that matter most on this coral. Do not buy a meat coral with a damaged mouth at any price.
- Check inflation. The photo should show a plump dome. A coral photographed tight to its skeleton, with every ridge visible, is either stressed or was photographed right after handling. Either way, ask when the photo was taken.
- Naturally pale is not bleached. Some morphs are light-colored on purpose, and the translucent look of the mantle can read as “faded” to a new eye. The difference: a naturally pale piece is evenly pale, and it is still opaque enough that you cannot see the skeleton through the tissue. Bleaching is uneven, and the skeleton starts to show through.
- Look at the underside if there is a photo. A clean, intact skeleton base. Cracks and chips are not fatal, but they are another thing to heal.
- Ask how long the coral has been held. A meat coral that has been in the seller’s system for weeks, inflating and eating, has already proven it survived collection and import. One that is being sold the week it landed has not.
The one photo that answers most of this
A white-light, top-down shot of the inflated coral, with the rim of the skeleton in frame. If you can see even tissue over the whole rim and one closed mouth, most of the risk is gone. Every WYSIWYG listing we post is photographed in our Key West systems, and the piece in the photo is the piece that ships.
What to expect when it arrives
- It will be deflated. Every meat coral ships shrunken. That is not damage. Set it on the sand and leave it alone; it takes one to three days to fully inflate.
- Check the mouth and the rim, not the size. A closed mouth and tissue still covering the skeleton edge mean the animal traveled well. Compare the rim to the listing photo.
- If something is wrong, photograph it in the unopened bag within four hours of the delivery scan. That is what our Live Arrival Guarantee requires, and it protects you far better than a photo taken the next day.
- Do not feed it on day one. Let it inflate first. A feeding response in the first week is a good sign, not a requirement.
Keeping it after you have bought it well
| What | Setting | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Placement | Sand bed, or a smooth flat rock at the bottom | The inflated mantle hangs over the skeleton. On sharp rock it tears itself. |
| Light | Low to moderate, roughly 50 to 120 PAR | It is a deep-water coral. Too much light too fast is how a healthy piece becomes a bleached one in your tank, not the seller’s. |
| Flow | Gentle and indirect | Strong flow keeps it from inflating and rubs tissue against the septa. A calm, expanded dome is the goal. |
| Feeding | Small meaty foods two or three times a week, pumps off, after the lights dim | Moderate, regular meals beat occasional big ones. Never force food into the mouth. |
| Neighbors | Nothing within reach, no sweeper tentacles nearby | It cannot move away from a sting. |
| Moving it | As little as possible | Every move costs it days of inflation and feeding. Pick the spot once. |
Acanthophyllia, Cynarina, Scolymia: which one is in the photo
Listings mix these up constantly, and the price differences are real. Acanthophyllia is the biggest and heaviest: a thick, inflated dome over a solid skeleton, sold as “meat coral.” Cynarina is smaller and more translucent, with bubbled lobes you can partly see through and the septa visible underneath as radiating ridges; older references list the meat coral under Cynarina, which is where the confusion comes from. Our cynarina care guide covers how it inflates, where to place it and how to feed it. Scolymia is flatter, disc-shaped, opaque, usually attached to rock, and the Australian pieces are now formally Homophyllia. If a listing’s name and its photo disagree, trust the photo, and if you cannot tell from the photo, ask the seller for the skeleton view. We will not name a species from a picture alone either.
Where to look
See what is in the tanks now in the Acanthophyllia category, the Scolymia category, or all LPS corals. Stock changes week to week, so if the shelf is empty today, check back. For the sand-bed open brain, read the Trachyphyllia guide; for what WYSIWYG actually means, read this.
The Underwater Gardener grows aquacultured corals in Key West, Florida (FL Aquaculture Certificate #AQ0254072) and conditions collected pieces in its Key West systems before sale. Livestock ships UPS Next Day Air every Tuesday and Wednesday.
Browse our aquacultured LPS corals for sale, conditioned in Key West and shipped UPS Next Day Air to the lower 48.
Corals in stock right now
Photographed in Key West, in stock today. Fill your box: up to 4 spots ship for one shipping charge. A frag takes 1 spot and a colony takes 2. Browse corals under $100 or beginner corals to fill one.
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