Cabbage Leather Coral

The cabbage leather coral is the soft coral long known in the hobby as Sinularia dura; this name is now considered a synonym of Sinularia brassica. The colony does not form a tall stalk; it spreads over the rock with leaf-like lobes with wavy edges that fold over one another, and from a distance it looks like a head of cabbage. Its polyps are short and small; when they are open, the surface of the lobes looks slightly fuzzy. Its color is cream, beige or light green.

It tolerates shipping well, resists disease and overlooks small swings in water parameters, which makes it a very good first leather coral. It is easy to find in the trade and is not covered by CITES.

On shallow reef flats with good flow in the Indo-Pacific, it spreads horizontally over the upper surfaces of rocks. In these areas with abundant sunlight it forms wide, low colonies.

• Light: Moderate to strong light (roughly 150–250 PAR) enhances its color and growth rate; it also survives under lower light.
• Flow: Moderate to strong, surging flow; detritus should not build up between the lobes.
• Placement: A horizontal surface in the middle part of the rockwork. Because it spreads sideways, leave plenty of space around it.
• Water parameters: Salinity 1.024–1.026; KH 7–11 dKH, calcium 400–450 mg/L, magnesium 1250–1350 mg/L. It looks better in water with some nutrients than in overly stripped water.

It is photosynthetic; it gets its nutrition mostly from symbiotic algae. No target feeding is needed; the fine portion of fish food that disperses in the water is enough.

Some species of the genus Sinularia suppress stony corals with compounds they release into the water. This effect is reported to be milder in the cabbage leather coral than in its relatives; still, it should not be considered completely harmless. The main problem is that its rapidly expanding lobes shade neighboring corals. Leave 15–20 cm of distance from stony corals and use activated carbon.

It lives with fish, shrimp and snails without problems. Some dwarf angelfish may pick at the polyps.

A piece is cut from the edge of a lobe with a sharp knife and tied to a frag plug with a rubber band; because its tissue is firm, the cut heals quickly. Do the cutting in a separate container and observe both the cut piece and the mother colony for a few days. Waiting for the cuts to heal before returning them to the main aquarium reduces the compounds released into the water.

• Shrinking and shedding: It may stay closed for a few days after relocation and during periodic shedding of its waxy film; do not turn off the flow.
• Detritus on the lobes: In weak flow, detritus collects between the lobes and the tissue beneath can rot; increase flow and, if necessary, blow the detritus off with a pipette.
• Excessive spreading: Trim lobes that reach neighboring corals in good time.