Size: upto 40 cm.

 

Key Features: Red, cream and brown, with walls and oral discs of contrasting colours; sometimes mottled. Colonies are cerioid and usually small but sometimes over 1.5 metres across. Corallites have irregular shapes and sometimes form short valleys with several centres. Colonies have moderately fleshy tissue over the skeleton.

 

Diet: Plankton, Zooxanthellae / Light

 

Habitat: This species is found in a wide range of reef environments, and does well in sedimented and turbid waters. This species is found to 20 m.

 

Conservation status: Near Threatened on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.

 

 

 

 

 

References:

IUCN Red List. http://www.iucnredlist.org/details/133106/0

 

Acanthastrea hillae. In Australian Institute of Marine Science. Retrieved on June 18, 2014 from http://coral.aims.gov.au/factsheet.jsp?speciesCode=0003

 

Acanthastrea hillae. In Reeflex , the Marine Aquarium Encyclopedia. Retrieved on June 18, 2014 from http://www.reeflex.net/tiere/1851_Acanthastrea_hillae.htm

 

Integrated Coastal Zone Management (ICZM) Project, Second Interim Progress Report, GEER Foundation, June 2012

 

 

Photo Courtesy

Charlie Veron. Australian Institute of Marine  Science. Licensed under CC BY-NC 3.0 via Creative Commons