Plate coral on the move!

What the heck?! I came home yesterday and my Plate was moved over a bit, enough that I noticed. So I moved it back, and behold! This morning it's moved again! Even further this time. Wtf? I don't remember hearing that Plates could move. Obviously they can.

The ONLY thing I can think of is I came home last night and the temp was up to like 80. Not sure why either. I turned down the heater and this morning it's back down to 76.

Is there something I should do? Place a rock next to it, perhaps? It's on the sand bed, BTW.

 

Yes, you've found out that plate corals are one of the quirkiest of all corals.

99.9999999999999% of all corals cannot move....but this one can. Not only that, they have a fairly nasty sting. I had one that would walk across the tank simply to fight with my Galaxia (which also has a fairly nasty sting).

I don't know if a rock would help you. Mine could navigate a minefield of corals like a huge Sarcophyton in the sandbed as well as smaller rocks covered with corals.

 

Yeah fungias can climb rock as well... Never experienced it first hand but heard about it.

Marc.

 

They can move by systematic tissue inflating and deflating water in their tissue!!! Pretty neat if you think about it! They can release cytotoxic secretions that can be damaging to other corals!!! Target feeding of these corals can help with growth rate and the development of mucus advantageous to them...

 

read the coral of the month!! I did a page on my orange plate. And yea they do move. Mine is always moving around to fight with my shrooms!! I think its going in the 100 soon!! Any one know about a white string that it puts out every night?? It mite be somthing else living on my plate...

 

Probably mesenterial filaments.

 

Im not sure what that is???

 

Mesenterial filaments are used by many corals to kill off neighboring/competing corals.

Coral Wars

 

You can fence it in with some smaller rocks around it. Or you can place it on rubble and it probably will stay put since it's harder to move on that.

Good luck with them. Long tentacle plates (if that's what you have) are awesome looking corals but I have never seen any that were alive in hobbyists tanks long term.

 

My long tentacled plate lived in my tank for about 3~4 years when I auctioned it off for a reef club auction. That was around 4 years ago and I recently saw it in their tank. It's now huge. When I had it, I target fed mine weekly. I'm sure that helped.