Branching black coral on deeper slopes; the skeleton is black, the living colony is not.
A branching colonial anthozoan growing as a bushy or feathery tree to about two metres, usually green-brown, grey or white in life. The name comes from the skeleton, which is dark brown to black, horny and hard, and which has been taken for jewellery across the region for long enough to have removed the shallowest colonies from many reefs. All antipatharians are listed under CITES.
Colonies grow slowly and are mostly below 20 m here, which is where the animals that depend on them live: the longnose hawkfish, gorgonian shrimps, several ovulid snails, and crinoids that climb them at night. Recorded from about 20 to 60 m, and deeper on clear outer walls.
Ratings are per location: 1 means found on most dives that look for it, 5 means a handful of records. Where enough dives have been logged the figure is calculated from them; otherwise it is an editorial estimate, and says so. We publish habitat and destination, not the dive site.
