Odd acro coloration

[jd474]

This acropora has been growing this way for several years, and has pretty odd coloring, and striations (sorry for crappy cell phone pics):

There are no pests in the system. It doesn't effect the coral's health (it is 2' across), and has been fragged many times, with none of the frags keeping the same markings to my knowledge. My guess is flow related, but areas like this that are out of any kind of direct flow, still have it:

and the other side of the coral (apparently unaffected):

Any ideas?

 

[jackson6745]

Looks like some of the branches facing the light bleached.

 

[nvdiz]

ya i actually think its not color... its bleached

 

[ReefWaters]

What about a "lack" of flow where the coral is white? Ive had something similar occur before due to poor flow on one side of a coral.

 

[jd474]

ya i actually think its not color... its bleached

I don't think so. Not for this many years and never recovering. Also, it's frags are right next to the colony. The specks of blue seen easiest in the first pic, are not from the camera, that is actual color. This system has about 300 corals/frags, and for it to be the only 1 is unlikely, to me.

What about a "lack" of flow where the coral is white? Ive had something similar occur before due to poor flow on one side of a coral.

Circulation is pretty strong, coming from a 1.5 hp pump, and eductors on all returns.

 

[rigleautomotive]

This looks like scarring and regrowth .The pigments are typical of a acro that was damaged from pests,light shock etc... and the regrowth develops different colorization then the old growth.I have seen it many times and I have done it to a couple of my colonies from something as benign as replacing old bulbs or excessive use of GAC

 

[ReefWaters]

jd474 - first off I don't know a lot about your system so I'm really just shooting in the dark here. But the more ideas you have the better right? Anyway, this looks like a stag? Is that right? I am going off of my own experience here and I very recently had a stag doing something that "looks" similar from your pictures. My stag did NOT like "direct" flow from return pumps/nozzles. It did however like random broad flow from my Vortechs. If I moved my return nozzles where they were pointing directly at a branch of this coral, it would lose its tissue within days. Looked a lot like this. If I gave it nice broad flow it would start to grow like crazy. Just my two cents from my experience.

The blue is a little odd. Does the white part look like bare skeleton or does it look like white tissue? If you really have had this coral for years and not months, and if it really hasn't gotten worse or affected the health of the rest of the coral, then I wouldn't worry about it too much.

Very very interesting though and I would also be interested in figuring out exactly what it is.

 

[jd474]

This looks like scarring and regrowth .The pigments are typical of a acro that was damaged from pests,light shock etc... and the regrowth develops different colorization then the old growth.I have seen it many times and I have done it to a couple of my colonies from something as benign as replacing old bulbs or excessive use of GAC

Interesting. It could've easily been from direct flow. A lot of times with this system, it gets excessively full, to the point where corals are unable to be removed from heavy direct flow. Colonies or frags usually become sacrificial lambs for the rest of the corals that are behind them, or downstream, especially the corals that are in abundance. Usually it just results in ordinary tissue loss, nothing quite like this. This system also went through AEFW a few years ago, so your point makes sense to me. Thanks for the input.