Need Advice - Open Brain Coral

[vstar72]

Hello...... sorry, I'm somewhat of a newbie I guess. I bought a Yellow and White Open Brain Coral about 1 mo ago and I'm not sure what's it's doing. Any advice? The white part (the outside) seems to be turning a brownish color in the creases. It's in a 50 gallon tank. I'm not too good on the target feeding, so it's just getting Kents's essentual elements and the green bottle from Kent's, along with phtyo every week.

If the site let's me.... attached will be a pic. Thanks in advance for any info you might have.

Lori

[RothChyld]

What kind of lighting do you have, how big of a tank, and where is he positioned? Sounds like he is turning brown because he might need more light.

Also if he is smaller in size I would feed it a silverside or krill. At night / early morning, they let their tentacles open up to trap food. That is the best time to tuck one in. If he doesn't open up like that, turn off all filtration, put the food right in the middle of him, and cover him with a net or something else if you have aggressive tankmates that will eat the food. Within 10 minutes or so he should fold up over it.

Mike

[RothChyld]

when I said size of tank, I meant measurement from top to bottom as I see its a 50 gallon. I am curious to see if your lights are strong enough to supply it with ample light if its on the substrate.

[vstar72]

The tank is 50 gallon, 30 wide x 18 inches deep x 20 inches tall. I have a Outer Orbit 150 HQI with 2-65watt dual actinic with 4 lunar lights. It is hanging about 9 inches above the tank. I have a Fluval 304 on it at the moment, but I want to upgrade it to a sump soon. It also has a Seaclone 100 on it too. 60lbs live rock, 80 indo-pacific live sand. I should have put that in the original post, sorry... The LFS said to feed him 1/2 shrimp as a suplement every 10 days or so, but like I said... I'm not too good at target feeding. Your suggestion to put a net over him might work though. I'll let you know.

[RothChyld]

I did a little more digging. My open brain was green and brown when I bought him. I figured the Zooxanthellae algae loss from light would turn the green areas brown. However, after reading this article (http://www.wetwebmedia.com/trachyreproart.htm) it appears a white and yellow specimen (which I never seen before) is merely a bleached form of the species. So in a nutshell, his color is returning. Also note what they say about feeding. It says to feed several times per week but no piece > 1/2" as they cannot live off light alone. I would start target feeding and other than that continue doing what you are. Its possible its color will return and he will survive.

My experience, I stopped feeding mine for a while and it did start to decline in size. I then restarted my feedings and he was happy and thriving again. Here is a pic.

http://www.cboss.com/~mike/brain1.jpg

[vstar72]

Awesome.... thanks for the info and quick replys. I had never seen this color open brain color myself and kinda wondered about it, but still thought it was nice. I'm getting prepared to feed him tonight just as soon as the HQI shuts off. BTW... your Open Brain looks nice! Looks like he's gotten bigger than what mine is too. I finally figured out my original pic was too large so I decreased the size. I think I have a pic of him when he was new too. It's kinda hard to see the difference because of the lighting/flash.

[vstar72]

AWESOME!!! I just fed him/her. The net over the top worked perfectly!!! Thank you soooo much, great suggestion!

[RothChyld]

wow when you said white and green I didnt quite think like that. he is severely bleached. Keep feeding him as I suggest and he may survive. You will really need to pamper it though to bring him back.

Mike

[Fishieness]

wow when you said white and green I didnt quite think like that. he is severely bleached. Keep feeding him as I suggest and he may survive. You will really need to pamper it though to bring him back.

Mike
yeah, you will def need to feed him or he could easily die. Never buy a white coral. But the good news is, the color you have been seeing, is it coming back :hi:

[vstar72]

I thought he looked a lil different than what he should look like.... but I thought his colors were kinda cool looking. I guess that is what I get for being a newbie.... I want to feed him again tonight, but he still looks full. His inside isn't puffed up anymore (like it does after they take the food), but his outer ring is still a little larger than the center portion. How do they get so bleached like that? Anyways... hopefully I will be able to get him back to what he should be... can't wait to see what that is :) Is it ok to leave him in the substrate or should I elevate his location closer to the light? Just wondering. Thanks again for the info.

Ah... I looked up the bleaching reason. Too hot of temperature perhaps. Is this the same as the white plague?

[RothChyld]

Keep him on the substrate. Dont move him. If you put him on the rocks his skin can easily tear when he inflates and thus infection happens and he dies. Keep doing what you are and maybe it will come back.

[vstar72]

:( My flame scallop moved a rock and it dropped on the brain coral yesterday and my hammerhead coral. The hammerhead coral lost a head - it's still alive and the brain coral swelled up funny. As soon as I moved the rock the open brain has gone back to normal size and appears to be ok again. Should be interesting.

[vstar72]

Ok..... my open brain coral has been AWESOME since we last chatted in August. Turned some great green/red color and was eating and swelled with life.

Lately.... he has been very skeleton looking. His tentacles do not open up at night like the use to, but he does swell up a little. But he does not swell up like he use to in the daytime.

Any ideas?

[Max]

What are you water params? It does look much much better!
Max

[vstar72]

Thanks!! I wish I had taken a picture more recently to show you how awesome he's been all puffed up and stuff.... he was the coolest.

1.023 <--- maybe this is a little lower than it should be?

PH 8.8 <--- it's always been very low
Nitrate no2: 0
Nitrate no3: 0
Ammonia 0

His mouth looks a little more open than I have seen it in a long time. Maybe I will try again tonight to feed him when the actinics come on (feed him a few days ago too). My dang cleaner shrimp is being a ahole though. Very aggressive lately along with my tomatoe clowns... they are acting like I never feed them (the 6 line too)! The only other weird thing is my 6 line wrasse is beating his head on the shiny sticker of my powerhead sometimes. I can't get my dang cyano to go away either, but I have coraline algae growing all over the place (recently scrapped it off) and my hammerhead coral is growing like a weed!! I add supplements to the tank twice a week (essential elements, strontium&molybdenum, seachem reef carbonate and purple up). I also try to add phyto once a week by trying to target it at my hammerhead, mushrooms and button polyps and feed the brain every three weeks a piece of shrimp. Once in a while I throw in some mystic. I recently killed my hippo blue tang, but I am positive I starved her to death. I thought I wouldn't add another hippo (or any other fish) to the tank again until I got the cyano back under control, but I fell in love with bi-color blenny and bought him a few weeks ago. The only other thing... is that my larger tomatoe clown was lovin on the brain a few weeks back, but the brain didn't seem to mind so i figured they were buds.

[vstar72]

Yippie!!! He's taking in the shrimp I am feeding him :)

The cleaner shrimp and other fishies are behaving tonight too.

[Max]

1.023 is dead on perfect ph well, try to raise it to like 8.5, other wise perfect. Make sure that all your critters are getting enough to eat. People tend to under feed in s.w. and over feed in f.w. from my experience. You are also going to need to feed your scallop live phyto every couple of or it will starve.
If you have cyano it means that you have dead spots in your water flow ,"probably anyway", put a couple of drops of milk into your tank so that you can trace your currents. You'll want at least 20 times per hour turn over as well to keep your inverts happy.
As to your additives be very carefull never add anything to your tank that you aren't testing for. Most trace elements are replaiced by water changes,"the only exception being iodine I add a couple of drops a week."
Sometimes clowns can be sort of rough on brains etc. they don't really have much tissue over parts of their skelton and it may have hurt it a bit ,"I doubt it though."
Most likely it just isn't getting enough foods like we discussed in chat the other day. I'd just make sure that you feed your mobile critters before you feed the sesile critters and you should do ok.
Hth
Cheers
Max