Acan, Blastomussa, Micromussa

[Jen-gineer]

I bought, what looks like a gorgeous acan colony, today from Exotic Aquatics...I think it was mispriced, so I jumped on it right away My roommate seems convinced that it's a blastomussa and not an acan colony, not that I care, still an amazing steal, plus it's pretty. So my question is...does anyone know what the difference is between blastomussa, acans, and micromussa?

 

I know that micromussa has discernably smaller mouths/heads, but is there a real difference between the three?

[djcerna]

Please post picture.

[CHUBAKAH]

I bought, what looks like a gorgeous acan colony, today from Exotic Aquatics...I think it was mispriced, so I jumped on it right away My roommate seems convinced that it's a blastomussa and not an acan colony, not that I care, still an amazing steal, plus it's pretty. So my question is...does anyone know what the difference is between blastomussa, acans, and micromussa?

 

I know that micromussa has discernably smaller mouths/heads, but is there a real difference between the three?

They had some single head acans for 45 that had the same coloration as the blastomussa, of which they had about 5 colonies of all marked pretty good. I was there for two hours today, and scanned every inch of that place. If you have several heads, chance are you got blastomussa. The only micromussa I saw was one with maybe 6 or 8 heads and it was like a dark gray.

 

Hope that helps.

Edited June 8, 2008 by CHUBAKAH

[davelin315]

There are a couple of Blastomussa species routinely available. Blastomussa merletti have small heads and the skeletons of each polyp are generally separated from each other (although they fuse together). Blastomussa wellsi have much larger polyps and the skeletons more closely resemble Favias and Acans. Blastomussas are distinguishable because their polyps are individual polyps that are not connected to the other polyps. Also, Blastomussa (in my experience LONG ago) can retreat completely into their skeletons.

 

I am far from an Acan or Micromussa expert, but from what I know they both have joined polyps (colonial in that they share flesh, or at least appear to do so). Beyond that, I don't have much knowledge of the differences.

 

By the way, Blastomussa wellsi seems to have leapfrogged typical Acans in price. I remember when they were relatively inexpensive, but that's not the case today!