mushroom coral and lighting question

[Jaybird]

I've been Googling and can't seem to find any answer to this: Does the intensity of light affect the size of the disk on mushroom corals? Since they are mainly photosynthetic, if they were receiving sufficient light they would not need to expand too much, or is this wrong?

I'm wondering because I have some Yumas that I got where they keep them under MH lighting. These are about the same size/colour as the store that I got them from.

I have some purple ones that I got from a fellow reefer who doesn't do much in maintenance on his tanks and the purple mushroom heads were about two inches in diameter but shriveled up during shipment (as they usually do) but have only expanded to about 3/4 of an inch in diameter and are not the same purple colour but they are mostly a deep purple with some light sky-blue spots. The spots could not be seen at all in the previous reefer's tank.

Here's the tank setup:

Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 0
Phos 0
Ca 420 (or close to it)
KH - don't remember

It's a 90G with two percs, yellow tank, hippo, yellow watchman, royal gramma, tiger pistol, bloodred shrimp, 2x skunk cleaners, 3x peppermints (or I could be down to two), 3x emerald crabs, yellow clown goby, acro crab, CUC, mostly soft corals, some SPS, blue acro, monti

 

[melosu58]

They are probably having a hard time acclimating to your lighting. High intensity lighting seems to stunt them a bit also. I have VHO lighting and they seem to grow very big in the tank.

 

[Jaybird]

Duhh!! I put down lots on the tank but I didn't include the lighting: 6x54W Teklight. Outside two are actinic and the others are a combo of 10K and daylight.

I think I'll try shoving them where I have the starpolyps (under the overflow box. That should cut back on the amount of light they receive. I'll move the starpolyps somewhere else.

I wasn't sure if it was the lighting that was keeping them from opening too much.

 

[melosu58]

What kind of lighting did your friend have?

 

[Jaybird]

pretty much the same light as I do, but on a longer tank and he can't remember when he changed the bulbs last.

 

[Bige]

Mine do that. The ones that are out in the full light stay kinda small. The ones that floated off and are kinda of hidden are huge. So maybe they grow larger to reach the light. If they get plenty then no need to work for it. Dont know for sure but thats what mine do.