Like their jelly fish and sea anemone relatives, coral polyps have stinging tentacles that they use to catch food. During the day, these tentacles are usually tucked away, out of reach of hungry fish and other marine animals. But at night they unfold to catch their prey, mainly plankton - small plants and animals floating in the currents.
Tropical corals additionally get energy from small algae living symbiotically inside the polyp. It is these algae, called zooxanthellae, which give the corals their colour.
There are three basic kinds of coral reefs: fringing reefs, barrier reefs, and atolls. Fringing reefs grow in shallow waters close to the coast. Barrier reefs are separated from land by a lagoon, growing parallel to the coast and forming a large and continuous reef. Atolls are ring-shaped reefs that develop near the sea surface on underwater islands or islands that sink, or subside.
