An anemone that does not sit on a surface but wraps its column completely around a branch, gripping a gorgonian or black coral stem the way a hand grips a rail. Translucent orange to pink, with short stubby tentacles, about 5 cm (2 in) across when open, and usually several animals spaced along the same branch.
That position puts it into the current without any need to grow a stalk of its own, and the host is used purely as scaffolding - the anemone takes plankton for itself and gives nothing back, though it does no visible harm either. Depth is the reason it is unfamiliar: gorgonians and black corals are commonest below 10 m (33 ft) on shaded walls, and a torch run along a branch is how these turn up. Closed animals look like swellings on the stem and are easy to take for part of the coral.
- column wrapped right around a coral branch, not sitting on rock
- translucent orange to pink, tentacles short and stubby
- several animals spaced along the same branch
- diameter up to 5 cm
