[Travis L. Stevens]

Not a problem at all. Quite frankly, collection location and color can be difficult to determine and can be a heated debate.

Often animals that are collected at lower depths tend to have more of a red tone to them. It's been theorized that this coloration is for "invisibility" to the naked eye. To explain further, the deeper you go underwater the more red spectrum fades from the light. By the time you get fairly far down there is little to no red spectrum light to reflect off of the animal, therefore making them "invisible" to more primative eyes. With that said, the theory would stand that the deep pinks, oranges, and reds of corals would be found deeper down.

On the other hand, coral pigmentation can be a benefit to the animal. A red pigmented animal can "reflect" red spectrum and absorb the yellow and blue in order to increase photosynthesis of its zooxanthallae algae. Therefore the brighter the light, the more is absorbed. But then again, this could be a light collection mechanism for deep water to produce energy from zooxanthallae in the most efficient way possible.

So, now you see both sides of the story. Just picking up a "red" toned animal can't determine its collection location based on the theories of the debate alone. You'll actually need someone to say where it was collected. Then you can place them in the most appropriate spot in your tank for maximum potential survivability of your new arrival.

You can counter the problem and kill two birds with one stone by purchasing captive propagated livestock though. For starters, the obvious is that it wasn't taken out of the ocean if you're the environmental cautious hobbyist. The second is that you know the general water parameters, flow, light intensity, and so on that it was housed under so you can attempt to match it in your home.

That's it in a nutshell.