Coral Bleaching

[Mrcote1]

I bought a coral a couple of months ago. It is a type of acropora and it used to be a very deep red. It bleached out in my tank but it is starting to grow again. Will it ever get its deep red back or is it a goner?

View attachment 20181222_124708.jpg

 

[Mrcote1]

*Double post

 

[Softhammer]

Looks fine to me.

 

[Mrcote1]

It's very white. It used to be a solid dark red

 

[ca1ore]

It’s not bleached. Color of SPS will vary by conditions - mainly light. That is has faded may be because it’s under too much light. Base is encrusting, so that’s a good thing. Not sure why you’d think it’s a goner.

 

[Mrcote1]

Here is a better picture of it. The other one had the filters of the camera on.

 

[Softhammer]

That looks more bleached. I’d move it to the bottom of the tank for a few weeks. Good news is that the polyps are still healthy looking. I try to feed all my corals that get to that stage too. If it truly is bleached the food will give it a better chance for survival.

 

[Sallstrom]

Looks a bit like some corals do in ZeoVit-tanks
Might be due to very low nutrients or like someone else mentioned, very strong light/high PAR.
The polyps expansion looks good, that's a good sign.

 

[Mrcote1]

Its sitting at about 350 par where it is. And yea I run a very low nutrient system. I was running 24/7 gfo but Im Shutting that off and going to feed reef roids every other day. But will the color come back as it was before?

 

[Sallstrom]

Its sitting at about 350 par where it is. And yea I run a very low nutrient system. I was running 24/7 gfo but Im Shutting that off and going to feed reef roids every other day. But will the color come back as it was before?

That depends on if you can mimic the water conditions, flow and light etc from the tank where the coral colony is from

Most corals change more or less in colour when moved from one tank to another. They adapt to the new conditions.

Edit. I may have misunderstood the question. Yes, I think the coral can get its colours back. I don't think it looks like it's dying.

 

[Mrcote1]

Im new with SPS. so should I expect all coral to look a lot more dull and have less color in my system? Or is that just the way this one coral may be reacting?

 

[BedrockIOMC]

There are many things that effect the color of coral. You could take that thing out of your tank right now and put it in someone else's tank and it be a different color. You could also move it to a different area of your tank and the color be different and then move it back to where it was before and be another color once again. Remember any changes made with your lights need to be made slowly and over a long period of time. They change colors time to time as well. But you also said you have low nutrients System and corals do need some to live on. I hope your nitrates are not all the way down to 0. You need to keep a small amount in your water. You really need to target feed them at least twice a week till you get the levels a little higher. Good luck with the corals and I hope some of us help you out with them.

 

[Gregg @ ADP]

The great thing about coral is it isn’t dead until it’s dead. This one looks good despite the pigment loss. Should come back fine.

Feed more and get a little more PO4 in the system. The corals will thank you.