BEAUTIFUL PIECE OF BLUSHING STAR CORAL FOSSIL

BEAUTIFUL PIECE OF BLUSHINGSTAR CORAL FOSSIL

BLUSHING STAR CORAL are ENCRUSTIG CORALS and are characterized by low spreading growth forms that usually adhere to hard rocky surfaces. Growing larger in diameter verses upward like many other forms of coral, encrusting species have a major advantage over their branched relatives.
 

BLUSHING STAR CORAL Stephanocoenia intersepta Colonies are thick crusts and mounds up to 1m diameter. Small cream, tan, gray or brown polyps with dark centers that are commonly expanded by day and appear to "blush" when retracted hence the name Blushing Star Corals. Blushing Star Coral, (Stephanocoenia intersepta) growns in colonies or 15cm to 75cm found in water depths of 3m to 40m.

Most structures that we call "coral" are, in fact, made up of hundreds to thousands of tiny coral creatures called polyps(eating invertebrate animals called polyps, which are anemone-like).Although corals are mistaken for non-living things, they are living animals. Each soft-bodied polyp secretes a hard outer skeleton of limestone (calcium carbonate) that attaches either to rock or the dead skeletons of other polyps. Coral itself is a flexible word. It applies to the coral exoskeletons that we see as the visible shells of hard corals and/or to the polyp animals that live within those exoskeletons.

Even though they measure just a few millimeters across, corals are animals: theyre multicellular organisms that have nervous systems and digestive tracts, and sustain themselves by feeding on other organisms overwhelmingly the plankton grabbed from the passing soup of algae, eggs and other tiny stuff. Theyre colonial organisms that live in more-or-less organized groups of hundreds to thousands of individuals.

SIZE: 12CM WIDE x 7CM DEEP AND 2CM HIGH
CONDITION: OVERALL IN VERY GOOD CONDITION.
PLEASE ALSO SEE MY OTHER ITEMS. I HAVE TWO OTHER FOSSILS AND SOME INTERESTING ROCK SAMPLES ALSO ON AUCTION THIS WEEK.