Can SPS have great coloration using only blue lighting

bif24701 · Mar 4, 2018

Here is a WD frag mount in about the highest PAR area of my display. Very bright colors already and has been encrusting well in a short time. If you can get bright colors and growth then you can pretty well assume that your light spectrum. and intensity matches well to the amount of nutrients/food they are getting.

ReefAddict16 · Mar 4, 2018

bif24701 said:
Here is a WD frag mount in about the highest PAR area of my display. Very bright colors already and has been encrusting well in a short time. If you can get bright colors and growth then you can pretty well assume that your light spectrum. and intensity matches well to the amount of nutrients/food they are getting.

Looks good. What do you keep your alk and nitrates at?

bif24701 · Mar 4, 2018

MccReefer said:
Looks good. What do you keep your alk and nitrates at?

NO3 5-8ppm, NO3 .03-.05, and ALK 8.8-9 DKH. I also have lots of flow, 100x gph display volume (180g).

jda · Mar 4, 2018

There is more red, yellow and green in a "blue" T5 than there is in a "blue" LED. There is also more blue in a 6500K MH or T5 bulb than there is in a "blue" bulb or tube... just more of the other colors too.

IMO, the by-far best coloration comes under 6500K bulbs with massive amounts of all of the colors... then illuminating them under something in the 14-20k range for your viewing pleasure. Just bulbs for actual coloration are oft not good at modern illumination - this is why most vendors grow and photo their corals under different lights.

...not that what who-uses-what matters at all, this was from last. The actinic that he uses have a spectrum more like B+ than an 03 True Actinic.

Similarly Jason Fox is running 4 250 watt 20K metal halides over his 700-gallon tank, but they are only on for 3 hours per day. He supplements these with Actinic t-5 tubes for 10 hours per day and ReefBrite strips for 12 hours per day.

Kmsutows · Mar 4, 2018

bif24701 said:
It’s possible yea. Jason Fox grows his corals under actinic and blue LEDs/T5s.

In the walk through tour he showed metal halides on his large, I think colony, tank.

bif24701 · Mar 4, 2018

Kmsutows said:
In the walk through tour he showed metal halides on his large, I think colony, tank.

Sure, on for only 3 hours. Most all the of his grow out tanks and other displays are actinic and Blue Reef Brights

Fourstars · Mar 4, 2018

Not speaking for Jason fox, but my guess Is he grows out under kelvin closser to daylight, and then colors them up under blue. But that’s just a guess.

jda · Mar 4, 2018

That is not what he talks about - the quote in my post above is what he told Mike Paletta last year. He also goes on to detail the bulbs in another video and they are very similar to B+, not true actinic. There are several high quality vendors that do use a lot of daylight spectrum for growth and color... Battlecorals does for sure (he says so) and RMF is rumored to do the same.

It does not matter what a farmer does... it matters what people do in a day-to-day reef tank. Focus on what some hobbyists do. Are you going to change 700 gallons of water every other week like Jason Fox does... or select your fish and nearly starve your fish to make sure that that workhorses in your aquarium... massive live rock sumps... CaRx? You are going to get better results if you emulate a hobbyist whose goals are the same as yours... to keep the same reef year after year. The real issue is that people pick and choose some from here, some from there and some from elsewhere. If you want a no-water change tank, then do what JBNY does... down to the MH, dosing, etc. If want a ZEO reef, then do what the euros do including the 10-12 bulb T5 setups and full-on ZEO system. Farmers have different goals and challenges than the rest of us do.

Scorpius · Mar 4, 2018

There are 1,ooo ways to skin a cat and the same goes for a reef tank. If you like the bluer side of the spectrum then run that. If you run blue t5's/led's made for reef tanks you'll do just fine.

Fourstars · Mar 4, 2018

Well, with the size of the frags now a days, seems like we are all farmers. I just assumed you would get the cuts to encrust faster at more of a daylight spectrum. Thats just been my experience.

BigJohnny · Mar 4, 2018

bif24701 said:
450nm, 420nm and 380nm are the primary wavelength of blueish T5s and LEDs that promotes the best color and growth. The whites on LED fixtures also can add to this but primarily the blues. Most important function of the whiter channels is to balance the appearance of your display to suite your liking. If you want to use only blue channels that’s fine too. Like I said JF doesn’t use white in most of his lighting setups.

He has leds though so only blue would literally just be blue leds, not a t5 bulb that has wider spectral range. I disagree completely that the most important function of the whiter channels is to balance the appearance of the display. I know that's preached a lot but there is science that proves otherwise.

Jason fox uses geisseman actinic blue t5 bulbs and reefbrites on his 400g cube. Geisseman actinic blue t5s, reef brites, and radium metal halides on the 700g.

He actually throws in some pink bulbs too on some of his prop/holding tanks.

The geisseman actinic blue t5 has violet/purple/actinic/green/yellow and even a little orange/red.

The radium has some of almost everything.

Sure blue is the primary for both but OP is asking ONLY blues.

I figured I had to nit pick ya one more time for good measure ; )

bif24701 · Mar 4, 2018

Still blue.

And corals can grow under 450/420nm LED lights only. They will have color due to fluorescence however may not have good health.

BigJohnny · Mar 4, 2018

bif24701 said:
Still blue.

And corals can grow under 450/420nm LED lights only. They will have color due to fluorescence however may not have good health.

What do you mean still blue? A Single wavelength blue led is all blue, geisseman actinic blue t5s and radium 20k halides are not all blue. I'm not debating that further because it's a fact.

As far as the second part, sure theyll have color (brown is a color), but all corals will not exhibit full coloration under only 450/420nm. Check out dana riddles research.

bif24701 · Mar 4, 2018

BigJohnny said:
What do you mean still blue? A Single wavelength blue led is all blue, geisseman actinic blue t5s and radium 20k halides are not all blue. I'm not debating that further because it's a fact.

As far as the second part, sure theyll have color (brown is a color), but all corals will not exhibit full coloration under only 450/420nm. Check out dana riddles research.

Looks blue. And now I’m picking on your specific and technical descriptions.