Seriatopora is a genus of reef-building stony corals. They are categorized as SPS, small polyp scleractinaria, or small polyp stony corals. They belong to the Pocilloporidae family, along with Pocillopora, Madracis and Stylophora. They are called spiny corals or needle corals and in English "bird's nests" because they have pointed ends and are disorderly branched. They are found in the Red Sea, the Indo-Pacific, and Pacific islands. The tentacle tips are often more opaque in color than the tentacles, as in their related species. The generic feature is the "pores arranged in series" in which the polyps are located - the rows of polyps are easily recognizable and can be used to identify and distinguish them from related genera, so distinguishing Seriatopora from Stylophora and Pocillopora is actually easy. The commensal bile crab species Hapalocarinus marsupialis can be found in wild or maricultured animals.
All Seriatopora are zooxanthellate and can feed purely on light. They are more robust than Acropora when it comes to water conditions, which makes them a good SPS coral for beginners. Most important is a strong current, or even a wave mode, to keep sediment from settling - especially old, large Seriatopora colonies tend to be very densely branched, so the deeper branches often don't get any current and die off. The species Seriatopora hysterix and Seriatopora caliendrum are often found in the trade. The difference between Seriatopora hysterix and S. caliendrum is that the former have more pointed branch ends. Other species like Seriatopora guttata, S. stellata and Co co occasionally make it to the trade by mistake, but are mostly wrongly identified anyway. The predominant color varieties are pink to purple and green to yellow, sometimes bicolored.
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