OK, I went to my LFS today and looked in the tank that had my coral. He had lots and lots of these corals. He had a big one and she had been in his tank forever and that one kept "throwing off" these little guys. He would put them on a frag stone everytime she had a new "baby". I pointed at them and said, what are these? He said they were montis. I said that everyone, including myself, thinks they are pavona. Said they looked just like the photo we saw online. He said we were all crazy and these are montis, no doubt. I looked at all the other "montis" in his tank. This one is definately unusual shaped compared to all the others, they were flat. The "mother" was more brown and didn't have near the little hairs that mine has. All the "babies" were fuzzier than the mother coral. Could the montis be hairy when young? We chose this particular coral over the others because it was kind of shaped like a cactus (hence the name, Yucca) and it reminded us of our trip out west. I'm taking my camera to his store tomorrow and I'll get a shot of the mother if I can, I have to work with his lighting so I don't know what I'll get. So, looks like the argument over who identified it first isn't valid no matter what? It's a monti?
Love the controversy!
Catherine