Hawaiian Ding Dang PE Color

Mr. Microscope · Feb 7, 2012

Hey there,

I have some HDDPE's. They used to have pinkish centers, but now are sparkly green on a dark background that fades from almost a dark purple in the middle to just faintly pink towards the skirts that also have green sparkles on them. I'd like to get that peachy pink back.
Any suggestions?

Tank is healthy.
DIY LED lighting (medium to very intense)
Target feed Oyster Feast every day

Thanks!
Mr. M

A. grandis · Feb 15, 2012

Wow!! 124 views and no one posted... :tongue:

Hi everyone, I'm new here.
Found this nice forum from Coral Pedia and decided to join!!!

The easiest way to get those "marks" back is to slowly bring your PAR up.

What type of lights you've got? How manny watts? PAR?
Those are questions that will play with your case.

Basically, brighter lights, more of those bright pigments. The brighter the more area the pigments will cover on the polyp too.

Sometimes when you loose all the marks you don't get them back as it was.
It could come back very similar, if you didn't loose all the light pigments.

There is a lot more to pigments than light alone and normally what I recommend is to increase the light a bit to see.
Other things to try would be to increase O2 through more water movement and some additives, like iodine, amino acids, vitamins and those to help with pigmentation.
I do believe that some target feeding helps with pigmentation too.

Good luck!

Grandis.

Gitsoe · Feb 15, 2012

this happened to me with some ding dangs, I fragged a few polyps and soon after all went back to a pink red color!

Mr. Microscope · Feb 16, 2012

Sheesh! Thanks for the replies. I was starting to wonder if I was alone with this one. I'm using some LED's and I was thinking that the light might be too high, but I've been slowly ramping them up in power to color up my SPS (of which I'm getting awesome color BTW). I guess we'll see if that helps. I also just ordered an MP10 which will help the O2. I don't use aminos, iodine, or vitamins, but I feed them oyster feast every day and larger food on occasion. I've been really wanting to experiment with vitamin C though. Here's a pic from about a month ago of it eating a whole mysis. I took this image just for fun, but it gives you an idea about the color I'm talking about.

I now have two more polyps on this guy. He came from a larger colony that melted. Luckily, I fragged it first.

Wy Renegade · Feb 16, 2012

A. grandis said:
Wow!! 124 views and no one posted... :tongue:

Hi everyone, I'm new here.
Found this nice forum from Coral Pedia and decided to join!!!

The easiest way to get those "marks" back is to slowly bring your PAR up.

What type of lights you've got? How manny watts? PAR?
Those are questions that will play with your case.

Basically, brighter lights, more of those bright pigments. The brighter the more area the pigments will cover on the polyp too.

Sometimes when you loose all the marks you don't get them back as it was.
It could come back very similar, if you didn't loose all the light pigments.

There is a lot more to pigments than light alone and normally what I recommend is to increase the light a bit to see.
Other things to try would be to increase O2 through more water movement and some additives, like iodine, amino acids, vitamins and those to help with pigmentation.
I do believe that some target feeding helps with pigmentation too.

Good luck!

Grandis.

Welcome grandis! Are you the same grandis from RC? Curious cause he is also from Hawaii.

@ the OP, I'll be curious to see how your increased PAR works out - please keep us posted. I've seen these under 300w MH in an 18" deep tank, and they were more greenish-black then pink. I've always wondered if they didn't need lower light as well, so will be curious to see what you come up with.

A. grandis · Feb 17, 2012

Nice polyp. Lucky one!

Be careful with vitamin C or anything you want to add to the system. Go slow, just like the lights...

Grandis.

A. grandis · Feb 17, 2012

Thanks very much, Wy Renegade!
Yes, I'm the same guy from RC.

Grandis.

Mr. Microscope · Feb 17, 2012

I moved the frag to a little more intense spot last night. I'll post an update if I see any color change.

euphoricgear · Feb 17, 2012

A few questions..

1. Did you just get the LED lights?
2. What light were they under before?
3. Did you just get this frag before it changed color?
4. How long were they under LEDs before they changed color?
5. How far are they from the light?
6. What other changes did you do to your tank?

I asked these questions because changing light can and will change your color.
LEDs are bright, and sometimes, even if they don't seem bright, they affect corals differently.

If you changed from another light to LEDs, you should have turned them down and light acclimate everuthing. I've had some corals (softies) get burn
from LEDs, like literally burn and turn black!

Also, it depends on what color you are also running your LEDs from 10k 15k 20k. That could also change your color on your coral.