Animalia > Cnidaria > Anthozoa > Helioporacea > Helioporidae > Heliopora > Heliopora coerulea

Heliopora coerulea (Blue coral)

Synonyms: Heliopora caerulea; Heliopora sparsipora; Helipora coerulea; Millepora coerulea

Wikipedia Abstract

Blue coral (Heliopora coerulea) is a species of colonial coral and the only species in the family Helioporidae and the only Octocoral known to produce a massive skeleton. This skeleton is formed of aragonite, similar to that of scleractinia. Individual polyps live in tubes within the skeleton and are connected by a thin layer of tissue over the outside of the skeleton. It was described by Pallas in 1766.
View Wikipedia Record: Heliopora coerulea

Infraspecies

Heliopora coerulea coerulea
Heliopora coerulea meandrina
Heliopora coerulea tuberosa

Endangered Species

Status: Vulnerable
View IUCN Record: Heliopora coerulea

Protected Areas

Name IUCN Category Area acres Location Species Website Climate Land Use
Ashmore Reef Commonwealth Marine Reserve 144062 Australia      

Ecosystems

Predators

Oxymonacanthus longirostris (Longnosed filefish)[1]

External References

Citations

Attributes / relations provided by
♦ 1Jorrit H. Poelen, James D. Simons and Chris J. Mungall. (2014). Global Biotic Interactions: An open infrastructure to share and analyze species-interaction datasets. Ecological Informatics.
Abstract provided by DBpedia licensed under a Creative Commons License
Species taxanomy provided by GBIF Secretariat (2022). GBIF Backbone Taxonomy. Checklist dataset https://doi.org/10.15468/39omei accessed via GBIF.org on 2023-06-13; License: CC BY 4.0