Haddoni / Saddle Carpet Anemone (Stichodactyla haddoni)

The related saddle carpet — a thick, deeply folded oral disc with shorter, beaded tentacles often in green, blue, purple or mottled 'saddle' patterning, sitting flat and broad on the sand.

Backstory

Frequently sold alongside gigantea and confused with it, S. haddoni is a hardier-shipping, sand-dwelling carpet collected across the Indo-Pacific. Color morphs (blue, green, purple, mottled) are wild selections; the blue and rainbow haddoni command premiums for the same reason as gigantea — pigment rarity in collected animals, with no captive-bred lineage in the trade.

Keeper tips for this variant

Unlike gigantea it buries its foot deep in soft sand rather than anchoring to rock, so give it 4+ inches of sandbed and high light; its sting is potent and it readily eats fish, so choose tankmates carefully.

Other Sea Anemones variants