Leptastrea skeleton turning green

Stelioshah

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I have had this leptastrea for a few months. It was encrusting in a spot that I didn't like so I moved it. It has been in its new place for about 1 month already. I noticed recently that its skeleton between the polyps, is turning a light green color. It still is completely brown in most spots but the green is spreading.

I saw a few pictures of leptastrea online with green skeletons. Is what mine doing normal? It definitely gets more intense light in the new spot, which could explain the lighter color. The "green" parts are not scrapable, they do not look like algae to me.

Do they actually change color due to lighting? Or have I messed up and it now is getting outcompeted by algae?

I startled it to take the picture below, this is not how it normally looks, it is retracted now. You can see the formation of some green lines on its brown skeleton:

IMG_20230623_165956.jpg
 

Mr_Knightley

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That's just the new color of your coral, congrats! I'm going to guess that the mother colony looked something like that, then your frag was put in too low light and lost some color. Coral color is wildly unstable, and changes with the littlest things.
 
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Stelioshah

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That's just the new color of your coral, congrats! I'm going to guess that the mother colony looked something like that, then your frag was put in too low light and lost some color. Coral color is wildly unstable, and changes with the littlest things.
Good to hear! I was concerned because all of the frags at the reef store had a brown skeleton as well. I was also unable to find any posts regarding the color change of leptastrea skeleton..
 

Mr_Knightley

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The skeleton itself isn't changing, it's the skin between the polyps, which would explain why you had some trouble finding results. Almost every coral will change depending on who's tank they are in! It makes it very fun to pick up brown frags and grow them into something stellar.
 

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