unhappy mushrooms

[mjmpinsky]

Well, I finally added the first piece of live coral to my tank.
It is a piece of rock encrusted with about 8 large green mushrooms. The piece was in my LFS for 3 months without being sold so I got it for only $32.00! The piece looked GREAT in their reef tank.
By the time I got it home - within 15 minutes the polyps had shrunk into brown globs. I acclimated for about 2 hours. Placed it in the tank and nothing for another two hours. Then The polyps started to reopen. However, it has been 3 days and they still look pitiful. In the LFS they were like large green leaves completely covering the rock they were on, to the point you could not even see any of the rock. Now they are pitiful green things the size of a dime to a quarter. I can occassionally see some tenticles moving so I think they are still alive.
How long will it take for them to get back to their full glory?
Tank has 100 w CFL and all chemistry seems to be OK. All the fish in the tank are happy and growing as are the cleaning crew members - hermits and turbos.
Is there anything I should add to the tank to help them along - ie: iodine. I had some Ca, Mg, Strontium additive so I add some to the tank - didn't help/didn't hurt.
Is it normal for it to take days for corals to adjust to a new tank? or is something wrong?
I am hesitant on getting any more corals till I know. :notsure:

 

[chris17]

Whats 100 w CFL ?? If it is compact flourecent lighting then I really dont think you have enough, not even for shrooms......but I could be wrong... I have a 10g with 60watts of mini compact flourecents on it an my shrooms I have are doing great..........If they dont have enough light, that could be why they are not opening up all the way, an if the lighting is too strong they will not open up all the way. I just bought 5 new shrooms on saturday an they have opened all the way up an look like they did in the lfs. Make sure you check everything again...params. an stuff then get back with us.HTH

 

[clarkiiboi]

I think I have the same shrooms. Mine did open fully the next day. What kind of water flow are they in? Mine seem to only like low flow, if any (I cant see them moving with the flow). I also have them placed on the bottom. If you are moving them around that could cause them to not open also. HTH

 

[msd2]

I am inclinde to think also that there is a concern around lighting. If you intend on making this a reef tank you are going to need to increase your lighting a considerable amount. Recall to run some of the more simple corals 4-6wts per gallon is needed, since your tank is listed as 65 that would require aprox 300-400 watts of light.
Mushrooms do not need intense light, in fact they seem to do poor in it, but the same is said when they dont get enough.

 

[spline9]

I got some mushrooms maybe 2 weeks ago. They seem to be doing just fine. I have a 29gal tank with 65w of 50/50 PC lights. They are on the bottom of the tank with low flow and fully opened up within a few hrs. I think I agree with the light theory with on your mushrooms.
If you see white tentacles, they might be stressed. Mine showed me some of that once when I was moving them around. They shrivled up and showed me some tentacles. After I left them alone, they went back to normal.
Try putting them in another spot in your tank.

 

[t n h]

we had same problem, had to get put then in one of our caves barley sticking out less flow less light doing wonderful now thow

 

[enomadra]

another thing to look at is the level of Iodine in the tank. Mushrooms like Iodine. I have used it before but have never tested for the levels or don't even know what the correct level should be at. I do know that when I add it to the tank as per the bottles instructions my mushrooms look at their best.
Remember adding anything to your tank and not testing for it's proper level is a big no, no:nope: . Don't be dumb like me, go get a test kit for whatever you plan on doseing, find out what the levels are then start to dose and check on a weekly basis.