Order
Scleractinia (Stony corals)
Balanophyllia elegans. Photo: (c) Ken-ichi Ueda, some rights reserved (CC BY)
Scleractinia, also called stony corals or hard corals, are marine animals in the phylum Cnidaria that build themselves a hard skeleton. The individual animals are known as polyps and have a cylindrical body crowned by an oral disc in which a mouth is fringed with tentacles. Although some species are solitary, most are colonial. The founding polyp settles and starts to secrete calcium carbonate to protect its soft body. Solitary corals can be as much as…
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Humboldt Life
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Kingdom: Animalia (Animals)
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Phylum: Cnidaria (Cnidarians)
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Class: Anthozoa (Sea anemones and corals)
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Subclass: Hexacorallia (Hexacorallians)
- Order: Scleractinia (Stony corals)
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Subclass: Hexacorallia (Hexacorallians)
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Class: Anthozoa (Sea anemones and corals)
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Phylum: Cnidaria (Cnidarians)
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Kingdom: Animalia (Animals)
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