What's up with this monti?

[b4tn]

This is not my first SPS I have several others including lepto's, another monti, birds nest, Jedi mind trick, and all are thriving. My parameters are all in check I check weekly and keep a graph. Tank reef is almost a year old. Now I got this guy about a month ago and he looked like this.

I am running ORT247's 13" above water on my standard 75 at 65% blue and 45% white 10 hours blue 8 hours white. I noticed that the coloration was getting lighter. It was mid tank up and the guy I got it from did say he ran a T5 LED combo. I thought it might be bleaching. And now it looks like this.

The center is more of a light pink and the edges are a dark purple. It still seems to feed when I spot feed reef roids and it is showing lots of growth.

 

[1Mjiggy]

It looks to be bleached should come back to its normal self in about 2 months

 

[b4tn]

Should I move it to a shaded area or leave it as is? It's already as low as I can get it.

 

[Salty1962]

It looks like the true colors are coming out. 1st pic showed the coral to be pretty brown, the 2nd pic looks like the rim has turned purple. I could be wrong, I would not shade unless is totally turns white. Monit's love light and med flow, if those things, and your parameters, are good just leave it alone and watch a worm turn into a butterfly. Nice piece!

 

[b4tn]

It looks like the true colors are coming out. 1st pic showed the coral to be pretty brown, the 2nd pic looks like the rim has turned purple. I could be wrong, I would not shade unless is totally turns white. Monit's love light and med flow, if those things, and your parameters, are good just leave it alone and watch a worm turn into a butterfly. Nice piece!

I was thinking the same but I cannot find any pics of one that looks like such a light pinkish/purple in the center. Its obviously growing and the purple edges seem to get darker by the day. The center is so light I can no longer see the polyps. Being pretty new to SPS I just hope I am not killing it. I seem to be keeping all the others successfully though.

 

[jjenkins211]

It is definitely bleached. It came to me as a wild colony. It is a cap that closely resembles the leng sy. It grows spires out of it and the color is a dark green with a deep purple rim. The polyps on it though are white. It definitely prefers medium light. The original piece was slightly browned because it broke off my main colony and I had it sitting in the bottom. It was colored up nicely under my reef breeders LEDs and t5. I switched to AI sols and kept bumping them up over weeks and it bleached really fast. Then I brought it back down and it got color back then browned. I have slowly been working to get the color right with medium light under mostly blues and medium flow. I have a 12" tall frag tank so it's hard to get things dialed in just perfect hence why I am switching to T5 and reefbrites. My old ever grow D120's got me great colors, but t5's colors were always better. The Sols have disappointed me.

 

[jjenkins211]

I run a primarily blue tank with very little white which gives me great growth and decent colors.

 

[b4tn]

Thanks Justin, thats a big help. I am going to have to find it a new spot which will be tough since its already as low as it can go in the tank light wise and my only shady spot does not have very good flow. I am reluctant to turn down my lights since all my other corals seem to be happy as is. As I get deeper and deeper into this hobby I am finding the biggest challenge is placement of new corals especially in a mixed environment. I see now why many have dedicated LPS and SPS reefs.

 

[Salty1962]

It is definitely bleached. It came to me as a wild colony. It is a cap that closely resembles the leng sy. It grows spires out of it and the color is a dark green with a deep purple rim. The polyps on it though are white. It definitely prefers medium light. The original piece was slightly browned because it broke off my main colony and I had it sitting in the bottom. It was colored up nicely under my reef breeders LEDs and t5. I switched to AI sols and kept bumping them up over weeks and it bleached really fast. Then I brought it back down and it got color back then browned. I have slowly been working to get the color right with medium light under mostly blues and medium flow. I have a 12" tall frag tank so it's hard to get things dialed in just perfect hence why I am switching to T5 and reefbrites. My old ever grow D120's got me great colors, but t5's colors were always better. The Sols have disappointed me.

Did b4tn purchase this from you?

 

[b4tn]

Did b4tn purchase this from you?

I got it from him but he threw this one in with several others I purchased that are thriving. This one has just been a bit tricky.

 

[jjenkins211]

Yes he bought it from me. It is very sensitive to changes. I do not have any great pics of it

 

[Salty1962]

Thanks Justin, thats a big help. I am going to have to find it a new spot which will be tough since its already as low as it can go in the tank light wise and my only shady spot does not have very good flow. I am reluctant to turn down my lights since all my other corals seem to be happy as is. As I get deeper and deeper into this hobby I am finding the biggest challenge is placement of new corals especially in a mixed environment. I see now why many have dedicated LPS and SPS reefs.

Lowering the light for a short time won't hurt them. It's much better too have little than too much. JMO

 

[rossco]

To me it looks like that center area was dead when you got it, and it is purple now as it has a new growing edge just like the outer rim in the middle as well. I am thinking it will fill in and be the normal color before long.

 

[Vaughn17]

Thanks Justin, thats a big help. I am going to have to find it a new spot which will be tough since its already as low as it can go in the tank light wise and my only shady spot does not have very good flow. I am reluctant to turn down my lights since all my other corals seem to be happy as is. As I get deeper and deeper into this hobby I am finding the biggest challenge is placement of new corals especially in a mixed environment. I see now why many have dedicated LPS and SPS reefs.

Yeah, finding everyone's happy spot, lightwise, is difficult.

 

[jjenkins211]

Lowering the light for a short time won't hurt them. It's much better too have little than too much. JMO

I 100% agree that lower light is better than higher. The caps I have found are very sensitive to LEDs and their intensity. It takes a short period of time to bleach and months to get the true color back.

 

[jjenkins211]

To me it looks like that center area was dead when you got it, and it is purple now as it has a new growing edge just like the outer rim in the middle as well. I am thinking it will fill in and be the normal color before long.

The middle was stung by a piece of bird nest so there was a dead spot. The purple is regrowth in that area. The edge gets an awesome purple color in the right light. It really is a cool cap when colored up.