Zoas versus Palys

[MiggidyMike]

After watching all the YouTube about this. It’s still sort of confusing. What makes the paly a paly and a Zoa a zoa? And then some websites have some species a Zoa and then another website would have the same species and call it a paly. What does the ARC community have to say about this? Thank you in advance.

 

[Rickdareefa]

Generally speaking, zoas have smaller, more colorful polyps, palys have larger, duller polyps, and protopalys have polyps on stalks that have more tentacles than the others and they do not grow from a thick mat. However, this is not always true, and the oral discs may be of different sizes in the same colony.

 

[MiggidyMike]

What..?! I did not even know there was protopalys. Ok, so what is the biggest Zoa? And what is the smallest Paly? And what examples of protopalys are there? I guess I can look up protopalys on google. And so some species have long pointy tentacles and some have round stubby ones. So both Zoa and paly can have the same tentacles? Or when it’s longer it’s happy and shot when it’s sad? Some pics online of the same breed seem to have pointy or stubby. Or are they just morphs? Haha I feel like I sound stupid, but I really want to understand this stuff. Haha I wonder if there is a Zoa/paly anatomy pic somewhere


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[bluesy1213]

I guess you could kinda of think of zoas and palys like - balls. They’re all balls but then you have tennis balls, baseballs, basketballs, all kinds of shapes and sizes. But they’re still all balls.

Different things (nutrients, light, parameters) play into how they look colorwise and sometimes the size of the polyps to some extent.

The same zoa/paly can look kinda different in two different tanks but still be the same kind.

 

[MiggidyMike]

Haha Balls! Ok, I see. Instead of balls I’ll use Felines. Tigers are Palys, bigger zoas are lions, and smaller zoas are like bobcats. Ballcats haha. And my water quality is the reason why some of my zoas/Palys do not look like online. Pertaining to the tentacles


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[MiggidyMike]

So cool, I just found this website that has some of them in categories. Sort of clarifies somethings for me. So a lot of breeds I thought were zoanthus, but really they are Palythoas.

zoanthids, palys, and protopaly names and picture id's

Reef Remedies is a fish tank servicing company which brings a personal approach to the business of fish keeping.

www.reefremedies.com

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[bluesy1213]

So cool, I just found this website that has some of them in categories. Sort of clarifies somethings for me. So a lot of breeds I thought were zoanthus, but really they are Palythoas.

zoanthids, palys, and protopaly names and picture id's

Reef Remedies is a fish tank servicing company which brings a personal approach to the business of fish keeping.

www.reefremedies.com

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I just say “zoas” when talking about zoas and/or palys and most of us in the hobby kinda understand that people use the terms interchangeably.
You’ll do good if you can just memorize the names of all of the ones that are out there. Especially when you see one you like

 

[MiggidyMike]

Ok, that helps a lot. Keep it interchangeable. Why stress it right. They all look good. This stuff is addicting. And everyone here has been great! I can’t wait for every single inch of my live rock is covered. I literally like them all


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