Leather coral life style questions

[marjimbo]

Hi y'all
(my mom's from Georgia). I'm new to this hobby/passion/curse, and would like to hear input on leather coral habits/characteristics. I have a small specimen (fully expanded he is 4"-5" in diameter) who seems happy some days and very reticent other days. On good days he folds out to full size and extends his polyps perhaps for several hours. At other times he scrunchs down to perhaps 1" high and 2" around. He may not expand and extend his polyps for two or three days. I have kept a close watch on the water numbers and they all look good to me as follows:
Sg 1.023
pH 8.15
Alkalinity 3.5 - 4 meq/l
Calcium 370-390
Ammonia - nil
Nitrite - nil
Nitrate near 0

Is my guy normal or am I having a problem and/or should I be checking something else?

Thanks
Marjimbo

 

[bhanson]

Are you adding any Phytoplankton? What type of lighting do you have? Leathers dont require real intense lighting but should have about 3 watts per gallon. My leathers like DT's live phytoplankton ( I also use Marine Snow sometimes), they need a decent amount of water flow. During the day (whenever your lights are on) their ployps should be extended.

 

[bhanson]

Ok I see your lighting information, 130W PC, that should be fine.

 

[MelanieF]

How long have you had it?

My tank is 95% softies at the moment and they never do that w/ the exception of the first few days in the tank.

BTW, I have been told that yellow leathers need more intense lighting than most... not sure if it's true... not sure if yours is yellow.

 

[marjimbo]

Thanks for the notes. I don't know if mine is a yellow or not - colour tends to yellow when it's fully open. I feed DT's every 3rd day (2 tsp for my 30 gal of water).

 

[Revstarky]

It's normal behavior for leathers to go through a continous cycle, open and expanded for the most part, then shutting down for a few days every once in a while. During this "down time" they exude and shed a waxy film. I believe this serves two purposes-ridding the leather of waste, and ridding its exterior of unwanted growth.
The fact that your leather is only staying open for a few hours at a time makes me think it came from a lower light set up and is having trouble adjusting to the PC's. Try moving it down lower in the tank.

 

[marjimbo]

A brief followup to my original posting. My leather went through a period of nearly 2 weeks where the polyps did not appear, but the stem varied between very small (1" cube) to a 4" tall mushroom shape. Then 3 days ago it returned to it's previous behavior of opening and extending polyps every day. I guess this is just normal behavior because it seems happy now.

Thanks for the input.