Bleached leather?

[StephLionfish]

We had a power outage for a week....power came back on and I was clueless and turned the lights back on w/o dimming them or raising them.

Well, half of my toadstool leather is bleached now... and I was wondering if it will recover? Will it kill the coral? The polyps are out, just white on half of the coral.

 

[StephLionfish]

Bump? Will my leather recover?

 

[chezhanks]

I this happens in the future I suggest putting egg crate over the top of the tank until you can re-acclimate them. It's a good thing to have on hand for bulb replacement as well.

 

[lgtentacle]

I'd definitely slowly reacclimate it, especially if it was previously a green toadstool. If it was the plain brown type, then it will color back up to normal more quickly. It will probably shed first though.

 

[StephLionfish]

Thanks guys. It is slowly coloring up. Starting with the polyps and working it's way down. It did shed. Hm, I didn't think of using eggcrate.. Just lay it across the top under the lights?

 

[lgtentacle]

If it shed already then you should be good to go. If the damage was excessive, then it may shed again in about a week and a half. Sometimes this will make the coral get a bit smaller (not from the shedding but from contracting) until it gains the proper nutrient storage levels back. The color will darken up a bit more with each shedding until it gets back to normal. Run your skimmer a little bit wet while it is shedding if you have a large number of other soft corals (especially sinularia) in the tank so that the chemicals expulsed in the shedding process doesn't take out your other corals and keep the shedded skin off of any sps corals (it can kill them).

 

[StephLionfish]

I don't run skimmer....
Wait a second...is it possible that the chemicals expulsed...or whatever can kill my tank?? My Water params are perfect, but everything in the tank ( 20g softie/lps and two turbo snails) are dying. The water was milky...did a water change with no positive results
If this dang coral is causing this then back to the store it goes...

 

[lgtentacle]

I'd have to say that with any reef tank, having a protein skimmer is a must. Yes, the leather will kick out all kinds of nasty chemicals (as will most other types of soft corals if they are damaged). It's part of their growth cycle and used for defense against encroachment of other corals. Water changes will help, but if the shedded tissue lands on another coral then it can cause some serious damage. You have a small tank, so try to keep the distance between leathers and sinularias as large as possible. Soft corals like semi "dirty" water, but it will be difficult to keep everything happy if you are just doing water changes. I highly recommend getting a protein skimmer and then you can watch your corals get happy.