Ugly neon green mushrooms turning a beautiful brown

[Mikey Donuts]

Just like the title says. They looked great in the store under weak looking PCs and glowed neon green on the bottom of my tank 14" from a 70W for about a week. Now they're slowly browning out. I placed them in partial shade on the bottom of the tank and it hasn't helped. My red and blue mushrooms look great under the same conditions. What gives?

 

[aquarius77]

I would consider letting them go and brown out if they will. Seems to me the light green "neon" color you seen before may have been a lack of zoox within the shroom from low light and now that its getting decent light its producing more zoox and thats why it looks brown. To me it sounds like it was getting healthier, the brown may just be a percurser to better things.
Atinic lighting would help colors pop if your running a straight MH with no backing and arent happy with the color, or a 20k bulb for your MH.

 

[Mikey Donuts]

Kevin, thanks for the info. I guess it's easy to get caught up in the mentality of "brighter colors = healthy coral". Whenever I've been diving, most of the corals I've seen have been either yellow or brown with the occasional pink thrown in the mix. I have never seen a bright green or purple acro in the wild, and I've often wondered about the perceived lack of color in wild coral (maybe I should leave this for another thread). I'll leave the coral where it is for now as I really hate to disturb the livestock in my tank. Hopefully it will color up in time.
Thanks,
Mike