Question

difference between coral & coral reefs​

Answer 1

Answer:

The main difference is that corals secrete an external calcium carbonate skeleton and sea anemones do not. This hard skeleton forms the framework of coral reefs. The tiny coral polyps occupy little cups or corallites in the massive skeleton. ... Corals feed on zooplankton with the use of their tentacles.

Answer 2

Explanation:

Corals belong to the animal kingdom, and are members of the same group of animals as jellyfish and sea anemones (Phylum: Cnidaria). The actual coral animal or “polyp” is soft bodied, with tentacles like a sea anemone. The main difference is that corals secrete an external calcium carbonate skeleton and sea anemones do not. This hard skeleton forms the framework of coral reefs. The tiny coral polyps occupy little cups or corallites in the massive skeleton. Corals can be colonial or solitary and there are several hundred species, some are large and branching and grow rapidly at a rate of up to 10cm per year, while others are mound shaped, growing slowly at only 1cm per year.

brain_coral_md.jpg (86641 bytes)

The second largest Brain Coral in the world, at Tobago.

Reef building corals live in symbiotic association with Zooxanthellae, single celled algae, which live in the tissue of the corals. The zooxanthellae produce the oxygen, that the corals need to survive, by photosynthesis; in return the algae are protected from grazing species and can access the nutrients that the coral excretes - a mutually beneficial association. Corals feed on zooplankton with the use of their tentacles. During daylight they mostly remain within their protective skeleton to avoid predation, but at night the tentacles are extended to allow them to feed. Coral colonies grow by having the polyps bud off new polyps asexually. New colonies are established by the fragmentation of skeletal pieces or through the settling of planktonic coral lava on a hard substrate. The lava are the result of sexual reproduction.