ORA Blue Chalice

[AugustWest]

My LFS has a 2" frag of this and it appears to be very blue . When I go to ORA's website the pic they have of a bigger colony appears brown, not blue at all.

Does anybody have one that has kept its blue color?

 

[fishieness]

ORA does their primary growing under sunlight and a lot of their pictures are taken before corals have a chance to color up fully. If happy, it does turn pretty darn blue, though IME, like some other chalices, it can brown somewhat easily if not under the right conditions. Some blue light goes a long way.

 

[klepto]

ORA covers this with their description.."Color varies significantly from pinkish tan, under sunlight, to lavender blue under higher Kelvin lighting."

Echinopora are not very difficult to keep in my opinion. If your tank is reasonably stable it shouldn't be hard to get this coral to color up. In the wild I believe they are found in shallow reef areas, so they can tolerate a fair bit of light too.

 

[wantacookie]

I purchased a frag of this from a lfs. It is a lot bluer than the Ora photos. I have it in the shade under a rock but pretty close to the glass. It has kept it's dark blue almost purple appearance for almost 4 months now. It has put on about 1/4 to 1/2 inch growth in that time. I decided to keep it where it is since it seems happy. I've been told that it will grow faster with more light, but will not look quite as blue.

Mine has also decided to encrust over instead of plating out like the ORA pics.

Here's an older crappy iPhone pic of the frag I have.

This is under 250w Radium.

 

[Bigcefa]

ive had this chalice for 2 years now my mother colony about 7 inch across has always held a nice baby blue color for me kept under t5 in middle of tank, my frags however i have some issues with them getting a little brown on me but it grows nice for me

 

[cody6766]

Mine was beautiful blue when I got it. Something made my water quality go to dog doo and the chalice deflated and went pinkish brown. I brought the quality back to snuff and the color and fluff returned. When it's healthy it's one of my favorite pieces in my tank. I certainly wouldn't pay big bucks for it, but I'd give $40 for a decent sized piece despite knowing what they normally sell for. $40 is on the top end of what I'm normally willing to drop on a coral, so take that for what it's worth