Neptune Aquatics

Spongedes (or Parasite) Attacked my Leptoseris

SeanMc

Supporting Member
Something attacked my leptoseris overnight. I think it's some sort of sponge or other parasite that lives on the montiora spongedes and comes out at night. My understanding is that monti's won't fight unless they're actually touching. Any ideas what it is or what damaged the lepto?

I'm in a little bit of a pickle because I definitely like the 24k leptoseris more than the spongedes, but I recently think I saw monti eating nudis on it so I can't in good conscience give it (or frags of it) away. It's a nice medium-sized piece so I feel bad about tossing it. But maybe they'll fight it out and reach a détente??

By chance, I have pictures from the night before. You can see the current suspect coming out in a kinda white spittle. It's about 10 minutes before lights out.

before.jpg


before angle 2.jpg


And the damage this morning. Exposed skeleton and angry gooey trails. A sharp line where the damage stops.

PXL_20250204_155356263.MP.jpg
 
You could clip away the parts of the spongodes that are too close and mount elsewhere if you think it’s warfare

Montipora generally don’t sting very hard, and leptoseris have sweepers and mesenterial filaments, so the monti being undamaged is weird to me

Update if it recedes more
 
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