What the heck is my torch coral doing?? (pics)

[Kevin Day]

Picked up a torch coral for my nano tank yesterday afternoon. brought it home, aclimated it, set it in the tank and it opened up beautifully for me. came in this afternoon and found it closed up but spewing (or for a more descript picture, "barfing") out some brown funk. It looked like phlegm or snot or something else gross. Is it just expelling it's algae? Is this a bad sign? could my torch be sick? perhaps this is normal and i'm just over reacting, this is the first torch I've owned so I have no idea what to look for. Anyone know what could be causing this?

here's a couple pictures I took while this was happening, this should give you a better idea of what i'm talking about. also, only two of the 5 heads are doing this, the other three seem content to just whirl about in the current.

 

[skilos1]

my guess is that your lights are brighter than what it was in right? if thats it then its just expelling some of its extra algae that it doesn't need anymore nothing to worry about

 

[Kevin Day]

the LFS had it in a 90 gallon hex about mid way down under 4x55 watt PC's, 50/50 bulbs. I put it into my nano, a 5 gallon bow, on the ground. currently my nano is lit by 2x13 watt pc's, 50/50 bulbs.

the lfs' setup works out to about 2.44 watts/gal and the coral was about 24" from the lights. now it's in a tank with 5.2 watts/gal and it's about 10 inches from the lights.

 

[Anonymous]

skilos1 is prob'ly right.

though you may want to shorten the photoperiod abit for the first week.i believe that one of the reasons for its dumping excess algae, is to avoid to much accumulation of O2 in it's tissues, which can damage the coral internally(a defensive reaction to the resulting O2 increase from the algae from the increased light)

hth

 

[Joe DeSantis]

You just put that thing in your tank. Don't look at it for a couple days it will make you crazy. Just let it be, dont move it. Colt, torch, frogspawn etc. are very adaptable. It will come around....trust me.

 

[Kevin Day]

thanks for the help guys, i'll cut back the photoperiod for a while. it's actually tanken to my tank alot more rapidly than i imagined. I love watching it. now i wont worry when i see it sloughing off excess symbiot.