🌈🪸 Acanthastrea echinata “Rainbow Emperor”
Mother Colony – Ultra Rainbow Acan Echinata
🔹 Quick Stats
Care Level: Moderate
Temperament: Semi-aggressive (can extend feeding tentacles at night)
Colour Form: The Rainbow Emperor Echinata displays an explosive combination of colours including deep reds, bright oranges, neon greens and electric blue highlights across the coral’s textured surface. Under actinic lighting the pigments glow intensely, revealing strong fluorescence between the polyp ridges. Under balanced white lighting the colony shows complex gradients of crimson, ember orange, lime green and metallic blue accents that create a vivid rainbow mosaic.
Water Conditions: 24–26 °C, dKH 7.5–9, pH 8.0–8.4, sg 1.024–1.026
Family: Lobophylliidae
Lighting: Low to Moderate (PAR 60–120)
Water Flow: Low to Moderate, indirect flow
Placement: Lower to mid rockwork
Type: Mother Colony
🧬 Overview
The Acanthastrea echinata “Rainbow Emperor” is a spectacular LPS coral prized for its extreme rainbow coloration and rugged skeletal texture. Unlike typical fleshy acans, Acanthastrea echinata develops a more armored surface with defined ridges and bright colour pockets across the colony.
This coral forms an encrusting growth pattern that gradually spreads outward across rock surfaces while developing multiple colourful feeding mouths. The intense mixture of colours creates a powerful visual contrast, especially under blue-spectrum reef lighting where the fluorescent pigments become highly vibrant.
As a mother colony, this piece already displays a large established surface with multiple colour zones and mouths, making it ideal as a display centerpiece or future fragging colony.
Selected for:
• Extreme multi-colour rainbow pattern
• Bright fluorescent pigments
• Healthy tissue and active growth edges
• Strong encrusting echinata structure
• Excellent colour response under reef LED lighting
🍽️ Care & Feeding
Acanthastrea echinata benefits from occasional feeding which promotes faster growth and stronger colour expression.
Recommended feeding 1–2× weekly:
• Mysis shrimp or finely chopped seafood
• Reef roids or powdered coral foods
• Target feeding during evening hours
📈 Optimal Parameters
Parameter | Ideal Range
Alkalinity (dKH) | 7.5–9
Calcium (Ca) | 420–450 ppm
Magnesium (Mg) | 1300–1400 ppm
Nitrate (NO₃) | 5–20 ppm
Phosphate (PO₄) | 0.03–0.10 ppm
📍 Placement
Place in the lower to mid sections of the aquascape where moderate lighting and gentle indirect flow allow the coral to expand naturally.
Allow spacing around the colony since echinata corals may extend feeding tentacles during nighttime feeding.
🌈 Acanthastrea echinata “Rainbow Emperor”
A blazing rainbow of colour across an armored surface — a powerful echinata mother colony built for collectors and serious LPS reef displays.