My opinion, I don't know... I've had mine for several years (maybe 5?). Mine started out small and bleached. I have a thread on here somewhere with pictures, you'll have to search (I'm almost computer illiterate). Here are some pictures of mine.
Here's a closeup of the tentacles. At around 7 oclock position, there's a patch of tentacles that can turn white, not sure if you can tell.
Here it is during the day, photo from a few months ago (tank is dark right now). It's all brown or orange. What most consider a drab color. Hard to tell in the pics, but, it's got at times, a kind of flourescent tint to the brown/orange color. I like it.
This is typical of how it looks during the day, every day.
I rarely feed it. But, have, and do once in a while. It does fine with no food, but the health of the tentacles and overall nem look better with a little food.
Here is it bunching up with food. It is pretty slow, but deliberate, in it's food reactions. Always has been like this
Here's a FTS. I don't know how long ago, maybe 6 months ago? Tank size is 210 (24x72x 29 tall). Anemone can stretch to 24+.
This anemone has 2 very distinct mouths it can eat with, and about 10 different slits that I think are mouths that react with food, but never really "eat" the bigger meals. In this pic, there's a white patch. I tried to get a pic, but it looks like a bud, the patch of white is actually lots of really tiny tentacles with a piece of flappy skin. It's still attached, but looks like it's trying to break off.
As for the white coloration, Reefvette has suggested back a while ago, he thought the white patches were stress induced. I agree. The white patches on mine can appear in minutes when I really make this guy mad. THey are usually never there, the anemone is always brown/orange. At night, with no light, I can see very faintly, where the white patches are, but under stress, they really develop and display. Happens right away after stress. Congrats on buying a nem that IMO, is the best for a fish only or a reef setting, provided you have a big enough tank for it. I have only lost fish to it (all of them) when it wandered a couple years ago into my MP40, shreaded, killed all my fish except my clowns. Mine hasn't really grown much in the past couple years, but it doesn't get fed often. I would think yours will continue to grow to the size it was in the wild before it was caught (if you've only had it a few months, I'm thinking it's still adjusting). For clowns, I think most or all use it as a host. It is a very forgiving nem, when it comes to flow, water quality, and light. When established, it's very hardy and easy to keep happy. Compared to gigs and haddoni, by far the easiest, but also the biggest. The nicest for a mixed reef, provided it doesn't roam.
