My SSC browned out while 30 other acros are doing fine. Phosphate 0.03, nitrate 0-2, alk 9. It's in the middle of a 27" tall tank with 400W Radium 8" from surface. Am I doing something wrong? Where should I move it to? More/less light?
Agreed, this is a very touchy piece. It took mine a month to color back up, and all I did was buy it at a local swap and drive it home. As long as it doesn't start to bleach I think you'll be fine.
I would leave it a while and see how it does. the less you mess with it the better they seem to do. I have mine 3/4 of the way down in a 24" tall tank with 2 400W radiums and it has great color.
I just got one last week. Looked great but lost some PE a day or 2 later. It's been browning for the last week but now has good PE. I did break it off the plug and give it a Bayer dip as soon as it arrived. :)
Since it's already in the tank I'd leave it. If you do have aefw dipping one acro won't get rid of them. You'll have to dip and QT them all. With any corals some kind of dipping routine is always recommended. I'd leave the acros alone for now. Keep your water parameters in line and monitor your corals.
While it's always a possibility, I'm inclined to say no because AEFW seem to favor many other acropora species over Microclados. Specifically Millepora, Valida, and Secale. Red bugs on the other hand.... much more likely IMO.
ok. I have a yellow corris wrasse and yellow head wrasse in there so hopefully they will help out. I'm hoping to get my new build up and I can dip all of them before I transfer over to the new tank. I'll check for bite marks when I get home today. The last time I look all the branches just simply look rusty brown. I heard about rust brown flat worm as well but I don't know.
Is this an ORA Shortcake or an SSC from someone else?
I have the ORA version and this thing grows like a weed and seems to be the most resilient in my tank. I have it around 275 PAR and back flow from the Maxspect Gyre.
the problem with the shortcake is that most off the ones getting passed around are cuts from wild colonies. instability and browning is typical to the point of expected at best. The frag simply crashing being the worst in that case and more common unfortunately that browning.
really just the same old same old. wild stuff is not stable. The massive influx of wild cakes has seemingly created this stigma which is unfortunate because like most captive raised sps. shortcake included they tend to fare considerably better in transit and color is a bit more reliable as well upon arrival and well into acclimation.
of course there are always exceptions but ultimately my point is that this is not a problem associated with shortcakes alone but most frags cut from colonies that were actually grown in the ocean.
So Id say no your not doing anything wrong. just treat it as gentle as possible an with any luck it will acclimate to your captive conditions:)
