Giant cup/ elephants ear.

[reefnewbie]

Hi, I have had an elephants ear for about 3 weeks and it seems very health, however today I installed MH's for the first time and it seems to have crashed... I put the lights (2x150w) at 15" high and only on for 2 hours as advised, but after about 2 hours, the coral closed up and lots of long white threads extended out of it. Its now all shrunken and looking very ill. I've not seen this happen before, is it dying or was it trying to ensnare something? I suspect the former...:(

[pavlo]

I believe the coral contains zooxanthellae algae that photosynthesize in a narrow range of wavelengths. By changing your lights, the coral is probably dumping zooxanthellae so that it can grow some more that is more suited to the new light. Hopefully it will be fine

[reefnewbie]

Thanks Pavlo - I hope so, it was very dramatic!