Trachyphyllia are a large polyp stony coral that is commonly referred to as an Open Brain Coral. They are a free living coral meaning that colonies with the ability to inflate their tissues and move around with the help of the water current. If they happen to find themselves in undesirable conditions they can attempt to remedy the situation by moving themselves. In an aquarium setting this movement is pretty limited because even in high flow aquariums, it really does not compare with the ocean. 

Tri-Color Trachyphyllia
Trachyphyllia are normally a single large polyp. On occasion you do find colonies that consist of one larger colony and then what appears to be daughter colonies surrounding it. This looks as though the coral may be ‘budding’ which is an asexual reproduction method but that is probably not what is going on here. What is actually happening is during the coral spawning events you will get a ‘stray spawn’ landing and settling on an existing colony. When they grow up it looks like a double or triple-headed Trachy. For whatever reason these smaller colonies are frequently seen from Trachyphyllia imported from the West Coast of Australia. The East coast of Australia has some of the most amazing and huge multicolored show pieces and Indonesia tends to have smaller colonies available again in really striking colors. There is a huge range in the skeletal growth and you can generally tell from the appearance of a colony where it was collected from.
Trachyphyllia are one of the most highly desired and prized corals among collectors of large polyp stony corals due in large part to their diverse coloration and the intensity of those colors. There are monochromatic fluorescent green striped colonies but there are also some absolutely stunning rainbow-colored colonies that find their way into the hobby. These show grade colonies can have yellow, red, orange, pink, green, lime colors and come as single mouthed or multi mouthed large folding colonies. Although you don’t hear as much said about Trachyphyllia as say, more popular corals such as Scolymia or Acanthophyllia, I think we can all agree that these corals are every bit as beautiful.
 
Requirements
Lighting: Low  about 100-150 par
Flow:  Low
Cal 400-440, Alkalinity between 8-10 Dkh, Mg 1400