Open brain bleaching out
 

Well as the title says, my open brain is bleaching out. Its on the bottom of the tank in the sand in an open area. Could my lights be to bright for it? dinoflaglettes effecting it? Or is it starving?

i have always had issues with LPS, they are so much harder to keep than SPS

LPS are difficult to keep in an SPS tank because they are somewhat opposites, LPS like lower light and lower flow, they also require feeding to stay healthy which is why they can do better in higher nutrient tanks. You have to find a balance to keep them together. Skim just enough to keep the sps happy (too much is bad), feed the lps corals once in a while, keep LPS corals out of direct light or high light areas, and direct flow upwards if possible to prevent high current in the lower sections of the tank where lps will be.

thanks shelps

ya its been slowly losing its color for the past 4 months. Sadly there isn't many places when i can keep it. Now i am considering building a nano LPS tank

here's a before and after shot

http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e6...0/DSCN0066.jpg

http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e6...0/DSCN6412.jpg

Red brains do best in the shade or partially shaded in a high light tank. They should also be fed regularly when their feeding tentacles are out. I changed my seahorse refugium into a brain/scoly tank rather than keep trying to keep red brains & scolys in my high light/high flow main reef tank.

Anthony

I can see why you are concerned, your brain coral was incredible before the bleaching! Where on earth did you find one with such beautiful colors!!!! I have a green one and find that it does not require much light at all. Where it is in my tank it receives medium light. I do however find it difficult to feed it because I have only caught it with it's tentacles out once. It seems to be doing fine without the feeding, still the same color and appears to be growing.

Just picked one up a while ago. What do you guys feed them?

Mysis.

I thought brains didnt really need feeding???

Most LPS don't need feeding, but they do a lot better if you do. I have started feeding mine more regularly again, and they are looking better than ever. It is definitely tough to keep an SPS/LPS mixed reef. My tank was supposed to be LPS dominant with some deep water Acros up higher, but my LPS don't like my new tank as much as I was hoping they would (lights are too bright and they don't like the Wavebox), so it is quickly getting more and more SPS. Dangit.

To give you an idea for lighting, I have a very similar brain to yours, and mine is happy on the sand (24" deep tank) with my 250w DE halides (they are 20K, so not high PAR) right under the bulb. I have 3x 39w T5s that come on when the halides are off to make a 12 hours photoperiod, but they are not on at the same time as the halides. The brain would bleach out in my 33g tank merely with 2x39w T5s if I didn't have it off to the side of the tank where the light wasn't as bright and on the sand (16" deep tank).

My brain gets fed only rarely, but the colors improve quite a bit if I feed it just a couple mysis every week.

Thx Myka :D