Organ Pipe coral

[nynikki]

I've had my eye on this beautiful coral in my LFS display tank for years. One day they had a small frag of one, and I just had to have it. Thinking it was daisy polyps (name seemed to make sense, since it does look like daisies), I took it home. I've had it for a couple of weeks, and it seems to be doing well, the frag is only about 2" and looks to have 3 small colonies of 5-6 polyps each on it. Searching for more information about how and what to feed it, I come to find that it is in fact Organ Pipe (Tubipora Musica), and now I have questions about how it will grow/propagate. The internet is failing me here, do any of you have any experience with this coral?

Will the skeleton grow? I expected that the colonies would eventually become one big colony and the entire piece would be covered with "flowers", will the polyps spread? If they do spread, could/will they spread to other items in the tank? I guess my confusion is coming from the fact that I have had a dead piece of Organ Pipe in my tank since we turned it salty. I picked it up when getting some live rock as a decorative piece. Could the polyps spread to the dead skeleton? See, lots of questions! :thumbsup:

Also, if you have one of these babies, do you target feed it, and what?

The pictures are really close up of one of the small colonies, it's amazing how different it looks at a distance.

Thanks!

 

[fsn77]

It will grow new tubes / polyps and spread. Mine has grown over other rocks, but it hasn't really attached to them. It just seems to grow across them. It seems to like as much light as I can give it, that's for sure. I've never target fed mine -- it grows well enough on its own. I'm not sure what I would do if it grew faster, as I find myself needing to frag it about once a month.

 

[greech]

+1. I never feed mine and it is doing really well in a medium flow/light area of my tank. Tough to tell from the pick but I don;t really see the pipes/skeleton. Are those polyps growing on directly the rock? If so I think you are correct with the daisy polyp ID.

 

[kjspruill]

It will at some point attach itself to the rock, I've been told. I have had a large one for some months now. They love lights and plenty of indirect flow.