Bleaching under my Acros branches.

SirKevinD · Jan 15, 2014

So I just moved my Millipora acropora to its new tank with maxspect LEDs. The milli was in a 46G bowfront with quad T5's. When moved to its new home I saw it had bleached underneath all its bottom branches. Is this normal due to lack of light or will the LEDs work differently than the T5's and color it back up? Kind of an SPS noobie here.

PaulKreider · Jan 15, 2014

I've never had it bleach underneath from LED's just fewer polyps, someone on here probably has the answer, probably stress related.

saltyhog · Jan 15, 2014

Don't know about milles but birds nest will actually die out below when the higher branches shade it out.

LAX Noob Reef · Jan 15, 2014

My red planets doing same thing right now, bleach a bit from under, but it's shape is pointing side way, instead of pointing upward. No clue what's wrong with it.

TJ's Reef · Jan 15, 2014

saltyhog said:
Don't know about milles but birds nest will actually die out below when the higher branches shade it out.

Agree as most likely scenario, other possibilities or in addition to could be low Alk and low flow. My large 10" x 18" Rose Milli is fully skinned down to its base but is getting a fair amount of reflected light underneath from the sand bed. I run all LED's and have for 2+ years on this system.

Cheers, Todd

SteelerMike · Jan 15, 2014

"Don't know about milles but birds nest will actually die out below when the higher branches shade it out."

I am actually noticing that on my birdsnest as it gets bigger. Do you have to frag out the dead stuff? Sorry to hijack

Isoprene · Jan 15, 2014

This is how natural reefs are formed my friend, calcium carbonate skeleton to live on, as they grow and shade lower areas the bacteria that give the acros color migrate higher and leave the skeleton bare, not energy sufficent to stay where they cant do photosynthesis! Leave the dead stuff, its support for the coral, least thats my opinion.

mcarroll · Aug 6, 2014

I know this thread is old, but....

Die-out in the center or at the base of a healthy coral depends on more than lighting.

If flow and available food supply are adequate, the lack of light will be tolerated. You'll probably see less color, maybe less polyps, but maybe neither if conditions are right!

For example, I've had a red Monti grow polyps and red color on BOTH FACES of the plate (topside and underside) where the whole plate was completely shaded out - but flow and food supply happened by chance to be excellent! (As a rule, plating monti's are unifacial...polyps only on top...and they don't tolerate no-light situations that well ordinarily.)

-Matt

Rob Top1 · Aug 6, 2014

I would agree with the lack of flow being a concern more than the lack of light. I have had this happen to several larger colonies over the years and when I noticed it first thing I do is it just the flow. it seems most of the time that stops the bleaching and quite often causes new growth over the old

-Logzor · Aug 6, 2014

I had this same problem with LEDs and I stopped using them. Had plenty of flow all around the corals. It's a common problem with this type of lighting, but not all people experience this issue.

Reefpharmer · Aug 7, 2014

This is the downfall of led lighting since it's so directional. I keep sps and the lower branches do die out as the colony becomes larger. I get good growth on top and in areas w light. I would say that if you get a mini colony, you will see some of this in the beginning as th coral adapts to the light that's available

brandon85 · Aug 7, 2014

go back to t5 plain and simple...

jservedio · Aug 7, 2014

-Logzor said:
I had this same problem with LEDs and I stopped using them. Had plenty of flow all around the corals. It's a common problem with this type of lighting, but not all people experience this issue.

If it were a problem with the LEDs themselves, everybody would have this problem. Plus, a big table is going to shade out it's base no matter what kind of light you have, yet the bases don't die off...

I had this problem for about 3 months when I got my Radions and had no problem fixing it - this is no longer a problem since I am no longer starving my acros of nutrients and food. More food = more color and growth, regardless if you use MH, T5, or LEDs.

brandon85 said:
go back to t5 plain and simple...

Yeah TJ should TOTALLY take your advice, his tank looks ATROCIOUS under LEDs... oh wait...

-Logzor · Aug 7, 2014

jservedio said:
If it were a problem with the LEDs themselves, everybody would have this problem. Plus, a big table is going to shade out it's base no matter what kind of light you have, yet the bases don't die off...

I had this problem for about 3 months when I got my Radions and had no problem fixing it - this is no longer a problem since I am no longer starving my acros of nutrients and food. More food = more color and growth, regardless if you use MH, T5, or LEDs.

Yeah TJ should TOTALLY take your advice, his tank looks ATROCIOUS under LEDs... oh wait...

I disagree, LEDs come in different arrays with differing optics. There are too many factors at play to say that if one person with LEDs has this issue, all should have this issue, you are in denial of the potential of this occurring at all due to LEDs. In my frag tank I had single branch frags that where they even slightly shadowed themselves, it resulted in die-off in those areas, tiny patches exactly where the shadow was. Clearly there might be ways to mitigate, with better flow and feeding, but recognize the issue can occur more often with LEDs due to their directional nature.

mcarroll · Aug 7, 2014

The same thing happens with the same in/frequency under halides.

I've never paid much attention to T5 so can't comment there.

Definitely not specific to LED.

You are right that there's a lot of "misuse" of LED's though...especially on tanks that are transitioned FROM T5/halide. However, it is more of a side-effect of the lack of info most reefers have to deal with....with many, many folks "eyeballing" their light setups based mostly on apparent color and evenness of light. Not a great way to go about it.

I predict that using a more traditional color setup (e.g. simple 10000-20000K'ish) than some do, combined with a handheld lux meter to judge relative light levels would solve 80% of those problems. Maybe more.

-Matt

jservedio · Aug 8, 2014

-Logzor said:
I disagree, LEDs come in different arrays with differing optics. There are too many factors at play to say that if one person with LEDs has this issue, all should have this issue, you are in denial of the potential of this occurring at all due to LEDs. In my frag tank I had single branch frags that where they even slightly shadowed themselves, it resulted in die-off in those areas, tiny patches exactly where the shadow was. Clearly there might be ways to mitigate, with better flow and feeding, but recognize the issue can occur more often with LEDs due to their directional nature.

My point was problems with LED are due to poor implementation and poor tank conditions, not an inherent flaw with LEDs themselves. If LEDs had some inherent flaw, everyone would experience it. That would be like saying T5s don't put out enough PAR because you had a bad experience with a chinese fixture with no reflectors and garbage bulbs. Do you judge T5s by the worst of the worst unit? Of course not, because it is rediculous - I could say the same thing to you "you are in denial of the potential of T5s having too little power" but it would be just as false as what you said to me. A quality LED unit with good optics or diffusers shouldn't have the problems you had if there isn't something going on with water quality or lack of nutrition.