Can't keep the pinks in pink mille

[Ibn]

I can't seem to keep the vibrant pinks in my mille. This is with both the pink one that I got from Aquatic Gallery and also the raspberry mille from Spencer (africangrey). The AG mille went from a vibrant pink. Here's the frag that I handed out to someone that wasn't in the club showing how pink it was when I first got it.

Mine is no where close to that at the moment. Right now, it's looking very pink lemonade like but in a mille, with a highlighter green base and powder pink polyps.

This is the raspberry mille that I got from Spencer.

Right now, it's more of an orangish color with pink corallites at the growth tips.

Don't have any issues maintaining blues, yellows, or greens in the other milles. The AG pink is in relatively high light and high flow area. The raspberry is in lower flow and lower light. Both of these mille also grow slower than the others.

Thoughts?

 

[tuberider]

Give it some time, IME millis need to get their growth on in order to color back up. Could be that the frag was cut (as it appears to be the case in the first photo) and still had color, and slowly lost color going into self preservation mode due to fragging and a new environment. I'd wager it will color up in a couple of months as it grows.

 

[Ibn]

How long does it usually take? I've had the AG mille since late November and the raspberry since mid December. The frag was made the same day that I got it (11/14/07).

That first picture is the frag that I gave away. The original piece has about 3 branches on it and another two that it's thrown up since then (about 5x the size of that frag in the first picture). The raspberry was really high up in Spencer's tank so it was getting quite a bit of light.

 

[Raddogz]

Fwiw, I bought a bubble gum pink millie colony and it kinda orange now.

 

[tuberider]

I have a piece (granted it's not pink) of ATL Sunrize milli I bought in November that is just starting to color up. As you know millis love light, flow, and loath phosphate. My $$$ is still on it coloring up soon....

 

[Ibn]

Seems to be the consensus. I'll wait it out and see how it does in the next few months. Gonna snap a pic of it tonight since I kind of like the PL look to it.

I'm seeing all sorts of color changes in mille/prostrata. The green base red polyp has gone an overall green color. Really hope that it goes back to the duo tone one of these days.

 

[Gomer]

Eric. You can always do a weekly photo "journal" on it :-D Progress hard to tell sometimes when the changes day to day are so small.

 

[LordHelmet]

Funny I seem to have no problem getting my millies to turn pink. It's getting them to stay alive is my problem. I gave a bright pink piece to a reefer who turned it blue in a matter of weeks.

 

[seminolecpa]

I have the same problem with pinks and red. They grow fine but they always turn brownish or like a burnt umber color.

Sorry had to break out the old crayola color table.

 

[Ibn]

I can keep them alive and growing, just not holding their coloration at the moment.

AG pink - highlighter green base with pink polyps
AG purple base blue polyp - blue w/brownish polyps
raspberry - orangish body w/green corallites
AC red base green polyp - highlighter green yellow throughout
competition yellow - highlighter green yellow topside, brown in the shaded areas

 

[nash]

Yeah,I have a whole colony of Red mille which took a year or more to color up from a brown.But after a crash last sept the thing is now green :'(

 

[Ibn]

Pictures added to show what they've morphed into.

AG pink - highlighter green base with pink polyps
Beginning (didn't take a pic of mine, here's the frag pic taken by someone else)

Current

AG purple base blue polyp - blue w/brownish polyps
Beginning (didn't take a pic of mine, but same lineage showing what it looked like before)

Current

AC green base red polyp - highlighter green yellow throughout
Beginning

Current

 

[Mr. Ugly]

Eric, I *told* you that we snuck into your place while you were gone and we helped ourselves to your frags

 

[Ibn]

LOL. Nothing worth snatching in my tank. Now, your's, that's a different story.

 

[Mr. Ugly]

You hide your stuff in the sump. I hide mine under bryopsis and asparagopsis

 

[Gomer]

Crazy idea from FW experience. Ignoring toying with nutrients, you can bring out certain plant colors by blasting it with light. I believe it is a response to too much light where the pant fights back the excess light and generates a "reflective sunscreen".

Is it possible that the frags you got had a substantially different spectral intensity? A lot of bulbs have sharp emission bands over a mild broad spectrum. Perhaps the original condition was like this with strong emission bands? Imagine 100 watts of a 14,000k perfect black body source over corals and then a 100 watt discrete RGB LED source. THat is a super extreme example, but the idea is there.

 

[LordHelmet]

wow. now that is a color change.

 

[northbay-reefer]

I have about 12 different corlor millis in my tank, what I notice is some millis changes color quite slowly, although they will brown out pretty quick when changes occured
I have some thats been browned for months, so millis will take a lot of patience.

The best thing to do is put your millis is a high current area, med-high light, and then leave it a lone if you keep moving it, it will brown out and might never regain the original color back. Some red/pink are particularly sensitive depending on your own tank's parameter the color will be difference too

 

[Ibn]

Flow isn't an issue, unless it's too much flow. Most of them are high up in the tank, above any of the other acros.