BRAIN CORAL-DEAD OR ALIVE

[JDSmith]

The brain coral that I have had about a month has suddenly lost it's color. I thought that this meant it was dead, but it has these red paddle looking protrusions sticking out from its sides. Does anyone know what this means? Is it dying? What should I do?

 

[johnanddawn]

loss of color and recession are definitly a bad sign. i have however seen corals like this come back from next to nothing. place it in the sand somewhere that will protect it a bit from flow and light. thats about all you can do. but what you need to discover is why it went down hill in the first place? LPS's in generally are not very difficult of coral but for some reason your tank did not support it
light - too little or too much??
flow - too little or too much ??
water quality - are your params in order?
food - in a very clean tank they need to be feed; in a tank with a lot of microbs and pods they may not need extra target feeding open brains do like to eat!
tissue damage - did you have it on rock or in the sand
irritents - was there a fish like clowns pestering it or a sand goby buring it?
pathogens - was there any sign of "brown jelly"
these are just a few of the most obvious possibilities - but there are certainly more