Looking for help from the SPS gurus

[jubbin2001]

So as some of you may/may not know my wife got me (well mostly for her) 2 acro colonies (complete with crabs). As I have not delved into SPS, I really want to make sure I am doing things right. Currently I am running 4x39 T5's individually reflected. Now I know they are for the most part a very light intensive coral, so I currently have them set about 5" -5 1/2" directly under the lights. I had some Koralia pumps on order because I also know they tend to like more flow than my softies, zoas, and LPS, and I was replacing my modded MJ ones anyway (I personally do not like them).
Here are the corals in question:

I am not really sure what they were, we were home before I even knew they were in the box. She said she got them for me

, but I am pretty sure she got them because she wanted acro crabs, and these colonies each had one. Only thing on the reciept was acropora colony...so no help there.
On the bottom pic some of the green is coming back a little bit, but I am wondering how long does it normally take to have the colors return to these guys? I guess I am just not looking forward to having brown sticks in my tank, and I hope they color out a little, or they are going to be kind of boring.
I have some new bulbs on order for my fixture as well because up untill this point I was just waiting for the old bulbs to go out (Currents because I didn't pay full price for them). This time I went with 4 UV Super Actinic, 2 UV AquaSun 10,000K, and 2 UV Aqua White 12,000K. I am hoping that the better bulbs will help out color these a bit better, as well as help with the general health and appearance of my tank.
Is there any other tips you guys can give? I am always up on my water changes and routine maitenance of my tanks. I know they are calcium loving critters, as is my squamosa, and LPS, so I will continue to dose calcium and the like. Just looking mostly to get the most out of these new colonies. Thanks all!

 

[jeanheckle]

It looks like a millepora. It should color up with some purple or blue tips. keep it in the top third of your tank if it is under T5's. They are filter feeders and eat phyto in the water column. You can add things like marine snow although there is debate on the usefullness of it. Light is the most important thing, sps have a micro organism which converts light to give the coral it's color and also helps it get protein out of the water column. You want to make sure the polyps covering the coral stay open, that is how it eats. They are slow growers but are beautiful.

 

[nietzsche]

you should be careful about placing arrivals directly below your lights. i light acclimate the new arrivals by placing them on the sandbed, then move up some each week.
You need strong flow for them, strong lighting, phosphates at or below .03 ppm, nitrates almost 0 (but is debatable) alk within 8-10 dkh with no sudden fluctuations, calcium from 420-480ppm, magnesium in the 1300ppm range
If youve met all the requirements, then it can take a couple months for the true color to come back. If theyre wild or maricultured then they may or may not make it or return to their original color
You also need to think about dipping your new SPS arrivals. Red bugs and acro eating flatworms are a couple of common pests. Red bugs are easy to deal with but acro eating flatworms are the toughest. Some wild colonies can come in with crabs either good or bad; the bad ones will break branches off at night and eat them

 

[jubbin2001]

The reason they are so high up is because they came from a MH system, were the light was only about 1.5' away from the corals. I know that the T5 that I am using right now is probably not putting out near as much light as that MH system was.
They have already been dipped before placing them in the tank

.
Flow is on the way

.
Calcium, Alk, and Mag are pretty close, but a little lower, so I am slowly raising those up.

Thanks!!

 

[nietzsche]

Thats good, just to let you know that some people have a hard time with wild colonies and may not even get them to survive in their tanks, pretty much a hit or miss