Yellow Leather

[JBrown2197]

I got this yellow leather from someone that was tearing down there tank, and when I got it, it had been buried beneath some rock and wasn't looking too good. I put it in my tank and the very next day it looked like it had come full circle. It had pinkish yellow color, instead of sickly purple, and it was growing little (for lack of a better term) spines on the top.
Anyway, it was looking really healthy for about a week, but now the "spines" don't come out and it maintaines a pinkish red color. What's happening? It doesn't seem to be slumping over or anything, the stalk seems rigid and healthy. I don't know how to bring it back to health, or what even caused it to be unhealthy.

Any ideas?
:confused:

[jdmarano]

It may just be acclimating to the lighting in your tank, especially if it had been buried for a while.

[JBrown2197]

Here is a picture of it when it was looking good.

[JBrown2197]

That seems funny. I would think it would stay looking sickly while it acclimated, and then look increasingly better. Rather than looking great right away, and then looking increasingly worse.

Maybe it just needs some prozac?
:rollface:

[jdmarano]

That actually looks like a Sarcophyton Long Polyp Leather Coral.

Mine also seems to go through phases, one day it is looking great with it's trentacles way out and the next it looks like it's not far from melting away :confused:

[tstone]

They go thru these phases where they don't open and look terrible, then they will slough off a layer of skin like stuff and look beautiful.

give it a couple days.

[Scuba_Dave]

I have a finger leather that went thru cycle Tstone is describing. Seems bad but after a couple days it comes right back. Part of the cycle, mine has increased in size since "shedding".

[JBrown2197]

I'm not positive on the id. The guy I got it from called it a yellow leather, and since I know a little more than squat about corals right now, I just went with what he said.
I hope you are right about the shedding thing. It was a nice addition to my otherwise boring looking tank.

[dvups1]

Don't worry too much. As long as you give it good water movement it will be fine. Oh yeah, that is not a yellow leather. I would say it is a common toadstool leather. Leathers always "molt" a layer of skin.

[Greg Hiller]

Yeah, that's not a yellow leather. They are much more sensitive, FWIW. I only have about a 50% success on fragging the yellows, but the brown leather's success approaches 100%.

[seasno]

Greg: I have a fiji yellow that is huge and needs to be frag'd soon...any hints? Sorry for the hijack JBrown

[jimmyj7090]

Agree, common toadstool, sarcophyton. Not yellow or elegance sarco. A hardy and nice coral. yours looks like it might start to drop frags/buds on it's own soon.

The close up- shed - look great> cycle is very normal and soon you'll see it as a regular predictable pattern.

My experience has been the same as greg's. Most sarco's frag very very easily but the yellow or elegance sarco's are quite prone to bacterial infections. I've fragged mine three times. once no problems. twice developed black areas. I did daily lugols dips and the frags with the infections recovered over a week or two and eventually attached and began growing. (after losing 50% of their tissue or more)

Suggestions- the true yellow ones need much more current and much much more light than the other sarco's. I keep my yellows right under a 400W Mh in strong current. My other sarco's will do fine in any moderatly bright light (PC's or VHO's would be fine).

I did two frags with rubber bands and one with bridal veil. I think the bridal veil might work better. I covered a small frag of the leather with it and secured it with a rubber band for about 10 days. The frag sort of grew into/through the viel. once this happened I cut back the veil as much as I could while still leaving a bit to hold it down (sort of cut a sheet of veil covering the frag to a small strip just holding it down). This combined with daily lugols dips when showing blackening areas worked for me. (I haven't lost a frag of the yellow sarco, but the common ones are attached and growing in 2 weeks, 100% success with no infections to fight). The true yellow ones take more like a month and then grow much slower.

Sorry to contribute to the hijacking, but I thought this might make for nice Sarco discussion.

jk

[JBrown2197]

Doesn't bother me, jump in if you have something to say. I don't know much about this stuff, so I grab at the pieces. How to you frag a coral? At some point I would like to give some of this to a friend of mine, but I'm not sure of the process.

[karl wagner]

there's a ton of good fragging information around, but I think that

www.garf.org

actually uses this same coral -toadstool leather- as their example for fragging soft corals. I think there's even a video instructional on that page if I recall correctly.

If you want to frag it (based on the size, it's not necessary to do it right away) let me know, I'll help you.

As for the condition, they do slough off skin and will sometimes rejuvenate. I've had mine for years and this sloughing never happened. I think the sloughing may be an indicator of poor water quality.

I also think that people improve their water quality (by water changes, carbon additions, etc.) when they see their toadstool behave like this, and it's a good thing too, because the coral makes these comebacks.

[Willistein]

I'd like to get my hands on a small yellow leather, if anyone feels like practicing fragging:D I can pick up.

Dan

[nanonano]

I think Greg have frags of the yellow leather.

[Scuba_Dave]

I bought a toadstool from Greg, it's doing very well. And a yellow finger leather from Aquaman68, also doing very well.

[Greg Hiller]

>I have a fiji yellow that is huge and needs to be frag'd soon...any hints? <

Yeah, give it to me!! I don't have any tricks past what was mentioned above.

I do have some yellow leathers that are available.

- Greg Hiller

[jimmyj7090]

I was unclear. IME the common sarco's shed regularly but I've never seen my yellow shed, just the occasional day of looking closed up.

jk