Fiji yellow leather losing color

[Kahuna Tuna]

Hello, I have a 180 leather coral dominated system and have a Fiji yellow leather that has turned a pale tan color. I just switched to AI led lighting and am getting some incredible polyp extension and colors out of all of my other leathers, mostly lobo's and sinularia but my elegans has been turning pale for a while now. The elegans is also having great ployp extension and looks very healthy despite the color loss. Any ideas?

 

[Potsy]

Those elegans can be a little more finicky. I'm sure it's a temporary reaction to the increased par from the AI.

 

[lgtentacle]

By "Fiji yellow leather", do you mean a true yellow leather or a yellowish/green toadstool that is sometimes called a yellow leather? True yellow leathers (the ones that don't have a toadstool base) can take some pretty serious amounts of light (and prefer it that way) compared to toadstool leathers. If you just got the coral, wait a bit to see if it sheds. If it is in the shedding process, it will dull down a bit in color and then look pretty spectacular after the shedding is done. You didn't identify where you have it placed in the tank compared to the other leathers, so it may need to be higher up, but I'd wait a few days and see what it does first.

 

[redfishsc]

Probably just light shock.

I always recommend (especially with AI fixtures) to run them at 30% brightness for a week or so and slowly jack the intensity up, until you think the reef is bright enough depending on your corals.

 

[jayg4u]

Might want to adjust the led fixture(raise it up) for a day or two and see if that makes a difference

 

[Kahuna Tuna]

Thanks for the replies, no real changes in color but the leather is getting bigger than ever and looks very healthy. I'm going to keep playing with the levels of light and see if that makes a difference.