Candy Cane coral is bleached...will color come back?

[Dodgerdave]

Hi All
I did a blackout on my tank a few weeks back. Algae is cleared up but there was a lot of consequences which included dead livestock during the blackout or eventual death within a few days of the blackout.
My tank is stable now, but only coral in question is my white stripped candy cane.
Prior to blackout - As you can see, it had a nice brown outside area.



After the blackout. It's a new light after the blackout plus a crappy phone photo, but the brown part is pretty much white now. Will it in time ever get brown again?



Thanks!

 

[Fly5150]

Is there any flesh left? Looks like that thing is a skeleton.


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[Dodgerdave]

Not really sure if there is any flesh left. It is hard to the touch. I would think it is dead, but when I feed reef roids, I can see both heads eating. I the heads collect a good amount of reef roids and getting sucked into the mouth. This has to be a sure sign it's still alive right?

EDIT: I did a reef roid feed about an hour ago. The candy cane coral seemed to feast on the reef roid. The heads look much more "fluffier". Hoping I can bring it back to life and back to original color!

 

[Number8]

The zooxanthellae will come back, it's just going to take time. I will lightly feed the coral every day until the color comes back. The coral is now relying on you to acquire food.

 

[Tangwich]

Its either starving or getting too much light which imo r the 2 major reasons corals usually bleach. So try moving it and/or feeding it.

 

[lowbudget]

It will come back

 

[CrayCrayFish]

Make sure you keep it at the bottom of the tank, they are not light intensive corals. Make sure you feed them once everyday (preferably at night). If the parameters in your tank are optimal, they should recover as they are hardy corals. Good luck

 

[Six2seven]

Sounds like you photo shocked it. No light then BAM new stronger light.

 

[KarL]

How long did you go without lights for you to lose some of your coral? From my experience, I've gone a week or a bit longer without light before and didn't lose anything. Sure they lost some of their color, browned out a bit.

 

[Dodgerdave]

So it's been about a month and a half since I originally made this thread. I've been using reef roids twice a week, heavily targeting the candy cane in question.
The coral heads feast, but the color has not come back. The candy cane is already in the bottom third of the tank....should I move to the sand? Maybe place in a shaded area?
I don't like to feed everyday since it's only a 8 gallon tank and I'm afraid of an algae breakout.

To answer questions from earlier posts:
Blackout was for 3 days.
Could be photoshock. After the blackout, I used the previous light for about 2 weeks and then changed.