impulse buy

[crsaz]

Alright I picked up a large (8"x8") "cultured" acro colony, I know I know, thats a no no but I couldn't pass it up for $50. for those of you with succes with wild acros,For you with succes with wild acro's what are some tips? right now I have it as low as possible (18" from 250w mh) and I have the ballast dimmed to help further acclimate, currently its about 15" away from an mp40(at 30-40%) its got nice strong, but not too strong of flow. my worry is rtn, the last colony I bought(when I was still new to sps) rtne'd after a week, and Im still scared.

 

[crsaz]

some pics( sorry for the bad quality but I have to use my phones camera)

I have a piece of acrylic acting as a screen.

heres one of the frags that is left from the last time i got a wild colony(the larger one right infront of the acan), 4 frags this size left out of a 4-5" colony

 

[flyyyguy]

looks like it could be a nice piece, but it could possibly be a tough go getting it to hold on completely

good luck with it

 

[Znut Reefer]

I usually only buy aquacultures. But I have got several wild (aussie sps) they are doing fine. Mine are frags not colony's. I hope you have good luck with yours. I'd frag a piece off after it settles. That way maybe you'll have a frag of it in case something happens.

 

[Slpolo121]

make sure your para is stable and in range and keep an eye on it. it looks good.

slpolo

 

[JAustin]

Stick with it and it should pull through. Here is my colony that looked like yours a month and two weeks ago.

Here it is the day i got itM

Here it is as of last week. It has more blue in it now but i don't have a recent shot.

 

[Chato2701]

Nice colors, good looking corals!

 

[crsaz]

so far its going good, it strated to stn so I fraged it a bit to open up the colony a little to get better flow to the center, and the stn'ing has stopped. and as far as I can tell the true colors will be yellow/brown base with purple tips.

 

[flyyyguy]

Stick with it and it should pull through. Here is my colony that looked like yours a month and two weeks ago.

Here it is the day i got itM

Here it is as of last week. It has more blue in it now but i don't have a recent shot.

that is what it takes IMO. Browning them out a little that is. These wild caught or even maricultured when they come in all bleached as heck, and getting them to get color of any kind is absolute success. Who knows what they will actually end up looking like, but I guarantee you keep it holding on it will look better and better with time.

browing out is a good thing in this instance. Its either that or having to frag it up becasue the coral starved

 

[JAustin]

You got it flyyyguy. They must brown in low light and then slowly moved up to color up. Browning is the coral fulling up with Zooanth. My colony is turning purple now. I imagine it should be a few months until it reaches full color. Most likely going to take a total of 6-9 months with stable tank conditions to reach full color. I do like buying them like that though because you never know what your going to get.