Green Leather Corals

[xplosive]

Hi,

First off, I am fairly new to corals. I have maintained a saltwater tank for about a year and a half now with a few invertebrates (sally lightfoot, blood shrimp, misc snails) as well a single clown and a coral beauty. I know now that the coral beauty is not the most coral friendly fish I could have added to the tank.

I purchased a small green leather coral about a month and a half ago and it seemed to do ok for the first week. After the first week it turned more of a purple color, but after some research felt this may be well within normal behaviour since I thought I had read somewhere that there color may change slightly. As of late though I noticed what look like white spots appearing on some of the branches (mostly around the tips). Now, I've never noticed anything in the tank even approaching the coral, so I don't -think- it's being eaten.

What can I provide here to get some tips on what might be going on? I am going to try and snap a good picture of it and post shortly but please let me know what else would help in the meantime.

[xplosive]

Here's a pic of the coral in question.
Small pic in attached, high res pic in link.

http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/IyD2HDemKAE6kgoctC2VUg?authkey=Gv1sRgCLjDjKX1yOaBG Q&feat=directlink

[AABatteries]

What kind of lighting are you running? What size tank is it? Are there enough nutrients in the water? Once we know that, we can try and go from there.

[xplosive]

30 Gallon
2 x 24" flourescent (1 white, 1 blue)
As for nutrients, I don't supplement anything, I was told the water was good due to the purple algae growing on everything in the tank, but to be honest I haven't tested the water since putting the coral in.

[ILuvMyGoldBarb]

Looks like a Devil's Hand. Not a good beginner coral. Are your fluorescent lights Power Compact fluorescents or T5HO fluorescents? If they are simple normal output fluorescents then that would be insufficient lighting for that coral.

[travie]

How often and how big are the water changes?

[xplosive]

I'm not sure if it is Devil's hand coral, I was just told it was a green leather coral and that it was a rather hardy coral to start with. I would be rather disappointed if this was not the case.

For water changes, I try not to do them if they aren't needed. At most, maybe 15% for a "big" change, typically once ever 3-4 weeks.

The lights are nothing special, just typical fluorescent bulbs.

[AABatteries]

Yeah, that doesn't look like a green leather, more like an SPS(stony-polyp, most require high light). With the 40w(1.33wpg) of lighting you have that is definitely the problem. The purple algae(coraline) is a good thing.

[travie]

I'm not sure if it is Devil's hand coral, I was just told it was a green leather coral and that it was a rather hardy coral to start with. I would be rather disappointed if this was not the case.

For water changes, I try not to do them if they aren't needed. At most, maybe 15% for a "big" change, typically once ever 3-4 weeks.

The lights are nothing special, just typical fluorescent bulbs.

10% weekly water changes are needed with SW tanks that have corals in them to keep the trace elements up for coral growth. Unless you want to test and supplement for all the needed trace elements for coral growth.

[rageybug]

Sounds like you will be getting some new lights soon if you want to keep up with coral keeping. Did the guy who sold you the coral even ask about your lights?

[ILuvMyGoldBarb]

I would have to say your lights really are not sufficient for it. It looks like it may actually be dying.

[xplosive]

The guy who sold me the coral also sold me the lights. Am I going to run into this issue with all corals with this lighting? I wasn't "planning" on upgrading the lighting right now......

[ILuvMyGoldBarb]

Not all corals would do bad under those lights. There are actually a number that would do fine. Zoanthids would live under that lighting as would many mushrooms. There are even some LPS that you could get away with if they were kept very high in the tank.

[xplosive]

Yes, I have a small Zoanthid frag I picked up at the same time that is doing ok. Would a short tentacle plate coral fall under the mushrooms that would do ok?

[ILuvMyGoldBarb]

No. Short Tentacle Plate corals are not mushrooms, they are LPS corals and they are not easy to care for.

[xplosive]

Just wanted to post an update.

Heeding the advice of insufficient lighting most likely being the problem, I grabbed a spare 18" T8 and positioned it over the coral to give it extra light. Also, additional research suggested it may need more direct water flow (where the power heads were positioned it was probably missing most of the current). After making these changes it is very rapidly filling in the white spots with purple, and has "puffed up" (for lack of technical term). I'm assuming these are signs of improvement? Anything else I should watch for?

[labnjab]

It sounds like its improving somewhat if its extending polyps, but I would try to get a better light asap. Being that its an sps it really needs t-5's or MH to thrive. t-8's don't produce enough light for an sps

[ILuvMyGoldBarb]

Lab, that's not an SPS, it's a leather.

[labnjab]

Oops, sorry about that, I thought someone said it was an sps earlier, lol

[xplosive]

Just wanted to thank everyone for the tips they posted here. After adding a slight increase in light, increasing water flow and picking up Kent Marine Essential Elements as a supplement, the coral looks very healthy again. I'm disappointed it hasn't changed back into the nifty blue/green color it was when I purchased it, but it doesn't appear to be dieing. All of the white patches are gone and it is extending its polyps during the day (hope that wording makes sense).

Short of replacing the lighting on my tank, are there any additional pointers that might help in getting this coral back to the color it was when I got it?

[labnjab]

I think increased lighting is going to be the only way to get the color back, but you may get lucky and it could come back on its own. One of the reasons coral becomes brighter and more colorful under brighter lighting is because it is its way to protect it self from the uv light

[ILuvMyGoldBarb]

Actually lab, the reason corals "brown up" under lower lighting conditions is because of the extra zooxanthelae then need to produce enough food to live. That added brown color is the extra zooxanthelae. There is of course a lighting level at which there simply is not enough room for more zooxanthelae and the coral will simply bleach out and die.