New Zoa rock, only partially open

[bjhubb]

I got a new Zoa colony on a large rock on 7/5. It had only been in the LFS for two days, and the lights had only been on for about an hour and a half when we went in, but it was about 1/4 open and fairly pale. I fell in love with the purple/blue/purple pattern to it, and we almost never see zoas here in town, so I thought I'ld give it a shot.

Now, it's only up to about 1/3 of the way open. And the color is intensifying, it has picked up a lot more green.

It's in a 10 gal QT, with a HOB filter creating a moderate flow. I have moved it to the highest flow area and that does seem to have helped. Should I get a nano koralia to increase the flow?

I also built a two tiered rack and raised it up to the middle 1/3 of the tank after the first 4 days. Then after 3 more days I moved it to the top 1/3 of the tank. The lighting is not great, so I thought that would be plenty slow for acclimation. There's a 48" flourescent split over two 10 gal QT's, and we added a 120w 5000k spotlight over what is now my trial frag tank.

Since it does seem to be improving, should I let it ride and see what happens? Not trying to rush it, but I don't want to miss something and let it die a slow and painful (for me) death.

Water Parameters
Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 15
PH 8.2

 

[DaddyReefer12]

Zoas are funny some times. I have hade zoas not open for a few days and then Boom they open. I think the flow you hav now is good. I have all my Zoas in a 20x20x8 tank with a little rio 90 power head and they are doing good. Lighting is t5ho's. Also another good thing to do is use Reviev to dip them. works great. Good luck with you new Zoas

 

[bjhubb]

update - There are more polyps opening up now, but some have died. I've been puffing them off lighting with a turkey baster to keep them clean, and the last time that I did that a few hollow 'shells' floated off as well. The open ones are looking great, color still getting better, and there may even be a few buds starting on the best areas.

 

[bjhubb]

One other thing we did, we pulled them out to clean the tank and put some Restore in with them before we put them back in. That seemed to help. How often should you dip them with Restore? Or is it better to use the Restore in tank as a food at low rates?