Does 5 hours a day of light really increase growth?

[Dana Riddle]

I bet they have great flow!

Actually not much flow. Coincidentally, I took the Marsh-McBirney electronic digital flow meter this afternoon. The highest velocity we saw was about 4 inches per second and often much less. Compare this to a 6" per second oscillating flow I saw on a Hawaiian coral reef on a calm day. But corals are growing quite well at the LFS - the Cyphastrea I got had encrusted the frag rack and had to be pried off.

 

[Dana Riddle]

And another...

 

[Brew12]

Actually not much flow. Coincidentally, I took the Marsh-McBirney electronic digital flow meter this afternoon. The highest velocity we saw was about 4 inches per second and often much less. Compare this to a 6" per second oscillating flow I saw on a Hawaiian coral reef on a calm day. But corals are growing quite well at the LFS - the Cyphastrea I got had encrusted the frag rack and had to be pried off.

Wow!

So Dana Riddle says that lighting and flow aren't important in a reef tank... ;Troll

Any idea how they have such good success? Is it just well adapted coral and stable conditions?

 

[KTTX]

More than likely your algae is under control due to low light.

 

[Dana Riddle]

Wow!

So Dana Riddle says that lighting and flow aren't important in a reef tank... ;Troll

Any idea how they have such good success? Is it just well adapted coral and stable conditions?

Did I say that? LOL. I think it probably depends upon the tolerance of low (or high) light of the zooxanthlla clade. As for flow, corals have a preference and studies have shown that some like high flow while others like low flow. The LFS that is most convenient to me and therefore the one I visit most often sells mostly corals that fluorescence when exposed to violet/blue light. Those corals containing non-florescent chromoproteins are a rarity in that shop, although I did get a Strawberry Shortcake Acropora there that I am trying to get to color up.

 

[kdino]

AS A SIDE NOTE, IVE BEEN RUNNING A SPLIT SCHEDULE OF 6 HOURS FULL SPECTRUM(ALL ON 100% ON MY HYDRA 52 HDS), 6 HOURS OFF, THEN 6 HOURS ON ALL BLUE (UC, VIOLET, RB, BLUE) THEN 6 HOURS DARKNESS. LATHER, RINSE, REPEAT. SO FAR THE CORALS ARE GROWING VERY QUICKLY IN MY 2 WEEKS SINCE BEGINING. PE IS GREAT (WHICH IT NEVER WAS BEFORE) AND COLORATION IS VERY NICE.

 

[KTTX]

This topic is very interesting...I wish a coral farmer or seller would comment on how they do it as they grow coral very quickly to keep the sale going...

 

[s_tempest]

FWIW I ran a split schedule for three years on my 14g nano tank. As this was my 1st SW tank I have no comparison to gauge my success compared to other tanks I had - my motive was simply to see my tank with the lights on more often. So I ran the light (AI Prime, heavy on the blues) from 6-10AM so I could get an hour of viewing before heading to work, and then from 5-10PM to get a few hours of viewing in the evening, with lights off in between.
I kept a wide array of soft corals and LPS, even a monti cap. My gut sense is that the coral grew, but maybe more slowly than I expected compared with what I read other have achieved with similar corals on similar time frames. The struggle (as with nano-tanks in general) was to keep water chemistry consistent so I'm sure that played a big role. I took that tank down early this summer and moved everything in it to a new, much larger tank.
Here's a photo to give a sense of how that tank looked:

 

[ArmyReefer]

@danariddle any update for this thread? Been thinking about changing slowly to a shorter peak time. Currently running 6 hours and would like to slowly get it down to 4.

 

[Darsh]

Any results?

 

[MombasaLionfish]

Any results?

+1

 

[MombasaLionfish]

@danariddle any update for this thread? Been thinking about changing slowly to a shorter peak time. Currently running 6 hours and would like to slowly get it down to 4.

+1

 

[Dana Riddle]

+1

Had to go re-read the 7 pages. Honestly, I don't see any advantages to a split lighting schedule. I've seen some YouTube videos that make some claims, but these are based on misunderstanding of zoox photobiology. A for reducing peak intensity, do you have a PAR meter (or any light measuring device?). Also, reducing light will be less stressful than increasing it as long as the minimum requirement is met/

 

[ZoWhat]

I do 6-6-6-6

6am to noon on
Noon to 6pm off
6pm to midnight on
Midnight ro 6am off

My zoas/palys has never look better, fleshier, growing.

I feel any light cycle past 4-6 hrs you're only growing ALGAE at that point

Lots of naysayers who havent even tried it......

 

[Copingwithpods]

I do 6-6-6-6

6am to noon on
Noon to 6pm off
6pm to midnight on
Midnight ro 6am off

My zoas/palys has never look better, fleshier, growing.

I feel any light cycle past 4-6 hrs you're only growing ALGAE at that point

Lots of naysayers who havent even tried it......

This is very interesting. My job has me out of the house 11 hours a day. I'm basically gone for the whole photo period and switching to this schedule makes alot of sense to me, I could enjoy the tank the few hours I'm home. I'll Def be following this thread for more info.

 

[Dana Riddle]

I do 6-6-6-6

6am to noon on
Noon to 6pm off
6pm to midnight on
Midnight ro 6am off

My zoas/palys has never look better, fleshier, growing.

I feel any light cycle past 4-6 hrs you're only growing ALGAE at that point

Lots of naysayers who havent even tried it......

Can you provide any PAR values? Glad to hear of your success!

 

[ZoWhat]

Can you provide any PAR values? Glad to hear of your success!

Dont own a PAR meter but I do have DIY retro lights that are exclusively 390nm to 490nm blue spectrum. I don't mess around with white light bc I don't care (nor want) the greens, yellows and reds in a white light.

6ft tank with three 300w lights covering each 2ft section.

Running lights at 50% power Definitely a deep penetrating blue.

All 300w per fixture dedicated to a mixture of 420nm and 460nm diodes with just a hint of 490nm.

I would say total mixture is:
* 60% 460s,
* 30% 420s,
* 5% 390s,
* 5% 490s

 

[Lingwendil]

1 watt LEDs? 3 watt LEDs? What drive current? Constant intensity, or PWM dimmer with a sunlight type curve? Black boxes with cheap EpiLEDs, or something with LumiLEDs/Cree emitters? How high from the water are the actual emitters? Lenses, or bare?

We need more information. I find the idea intriguing but want to be methodical about it- this means more meaningfull data.