Lobed brain coral

At first sight the lobed brain coral (Lobophyllia hemprichii) looks more like a pile of fleshy cushions than a stony coral: the colony surface is covered in thick, wavy-edged lobes coated in swollen, velvety living tissue. The tissue is so thick – up to several centimetres – that the hard skeleton disappears completely beneath it. Its palette is among the richest on the reef: red, maroon, green, blue-grey and cream forms often grow side by side in a mosaic on a single mound, where neighbouring colonies meet.

The chunky lobes are in fact giant polyps: each lobe is one huge polyp, or a fused giant with several mouths, ranking among the largest polyps of all stony corals. By day the swollen tissue works as a "solar farm" for its zooxanthellae algae; at night thick tentacles unfurl from the centres of the lobes and the colony actively hunts plankton. It is a slow-growing, long-lived species that reproduces on summer nights after the full moon, during the great coral spawning events.

Around Hurghada you will find it on the reef slopes and on the coral heads of the plateaus, typically between 5 and 25 metres, though it also appears in the shallower gardens – the colourful colonies are favourites of night and wide-angle photographers. The thick, soft-looking tissue may be tempting, but it is precisely the most vulnerable part: a touch can tear it open and the wound infects easily. The rule never changes: admire, photograph, never touch.