Is it true that real sunlight is bad for LPS?

[Dule T&T]

You could possibly try a light coating of blue cellophane on the underside of the glass roof to limit some of the spectrum as well. There are many varieties available online. You'd still have the issue with intensity being unregulated though. While the lps may not mind a week or so of rather cloudy weather, your sps and clams may begin to suffer in that situation if it becomes excessive.

Yes, I am thinking to add something blue in the LPS section.
I was thinking about blue transparent polycarbonate sheets, but I couldn't find them.

Will check blue cellophane that you mentioned.

 

[mdb_talon]

got to mention that I actually live in the Caribbean, so there's an actual reef in the ocean close to me.
My thinking was - if they can survive in the ocean with this exact same weather pattern, why not in my "farm" few miles from the reef?
If I am not wrong Pacific corals that we all keep also come from the region that has rainy season... and corals seems ok with it.

I would not be too worried about rainy and cloudy days. Some existing greenhouse farms grow coral in much less ideal weather conditions than you will be experiencing where you are. I still agree though that until you get the supplemental blue spectrum LED the coloration of a lot of it will likely be poor.

 

[Dule T&T]

Seems like we're forgetting the terms "SPS" and "LPS" are just colloquial terms and have no relevance to the environmental or nutrional requirements of corals. No matter what lighting conditions you have there will be corals that like it and corals that don't. Many of the so called "LPS" can be found in shallow water and even exposed at low tide. Fluorescing and chromo proteins are made by corals to deal with less than ideal lighting for their zooxantheallae. Seems to me the primary consideration should be finding the ideal PAR level for a coral to minimize the need for making coloring proteins and changing lighting conditions to color them up just for sale.

My thoughts exactly.
Seems to me that initial idea of using the "best natural light" might be trickier than I expected.
I think maybe best solution in this case is to use natural sunlight as a "white" and supplement "blue" with LED.

But I will test and see how LPS will behave under sunlight only first.

I will post some pics and videos of the "farm" later.

 

[Rmckoy]

I would not be too worried about rainy and cloudy days. Some existing greenhouse farms grow coral in much less ideal weather conditions than you will be experiencing where you are. I still agree though that until you get the supplemental blue spectrum LED the coloration of a lot of it will likely be poor.

Poor =natural ?

 

[AquaBiomics]

LPS are happy in my greenhouse, just like all my other corals. I do shade the whole greenhouse with blue shade cloth, and supplement with blue LED on the LPS tanks.

In my view any suggestion that natural levels (whether its salinity, alkalinity, or sunlight) are "bad for corals" should be viewed with a good deal of skepticism

 

[Pistondog]

For lps if intensity becomes a problem then shade with cardboard, the lps will get indirect sunlight.

 

[mdb_talon]

Poor =natural ?

Sure if you think it is natural for lps to be blasted by white/uv and red spectrum. However we know that is not the case generally speaking in their natural environment.

 

[Rmckoy]

Sure if you think it is natural for lps to be blasted by white/uv and red spectrum. However we know that is not the case generally speaking in their natural environment.

Blasted no .
I was referring to sunlight in general being natural

 

[Timfish]

Sure if you think it is natural for lps to be blasted by white/uv and red spectrum. However we know that is not the case generally speaking in their natural environment.

Sorry, but it is natural for so called "LPS" to be blasted by sunlight. Besides scholarly references like AIMS.com coral data base and J. E. N. Veron's books you can go to youtube and find videos like the one below showing stony corals, octocorals and sponges exposed together at low tide. The notion that the colloquial terms "LPS", "Softies" and "SPS" denotes seperate classes of animals and incudes environmantal and nutritional requirements is just dogma that has built up over the decades and is patently false.

 

[mdb_talon]

Sorry, but it is natural for so called "LPS" to be blasted by sunlight. Besides scholarly references like AIMS.com coral data base and J. E. N. Veron's books you can go to youtube and find videos like the one below showing stony corals, octocorals and sponges exposed together at low tide. The notion that the colloquial terms "LPS", "Softies" and "SPS" denotes seperate classes of animals and incudes environmantal and nutritional requirements is just dogma that has built up over the decades and is patently false.

Yet we know the vast majority of LPS corals are collected deeper than the top several feet of water. Whether you want to be obtuse about the mention of LPS is irrelevant as it is a commonly used and understood definition to describe a group of corals. Of course there are exceptions where LPS corals thrive near the surface. That though is the exception and not generally what is found with corals we identify as LPS.

 

[mdb_talon]

Blasted no .
I was referring to sunlight in general being natural

Yes of course sunlight is natural. Sunlight in 12 inches of water however is much different than sunlight in 30ft or more of water is my point. If you are trying to mimic what the natural light environment then a foot or two of water and sunlight is not doing it for most corals.

I assume this is why every greenhouse style farm i have seen either uses led supplements or types of cloth designed to allow more blue spectrum to come through

 

[Timfish]

Yet we know the vast majority of LPS corals are collected deeper than the top several feet of water. Whether you want to be obtuse about the mention of LPS is irrelevant as it is a commonly used and understood definition to describe a group of corals. Of course there are exceptions where LPS corals thrive near the surface. That though is the exception and not generally what is found with corals we identify as LPS.

Obtuse -
a: lacking sharpness or quickness of sensibility or intellect.
b: difficult to comprehend : not clear or precise in thought or expression

Well, I've been called a lot worse.

You're right though, the corals we keep for the most part are collected, in the case of wild corals, or grown, in the case of maricultured corals, at much deeper levels than at the surface. But that's as true for so called SPS as the so called LPS as well as the so called "Softies" Using these terms to collectively denote environmental and nutritional requirements for species that in some cases may not even be found in the same conditions in the wild and may be more distantly related than cats and dogs can only result in unneccessary death of animals and frustration on the part of aquarists. Reffering back to the OP as an example of how this misunderstanding could kill coral as there are certainly so called "SPS" that would die if placed in sunlight even at lower light intensity levels.

Instead of sticking with decades old dogma we need to be looking at the research showing there can be significant differences between sibling species within a genus as well as between genotypes within a species. We also need to be sensitive to research showing how the microbial processes in our systems influence the health of our animals. Veron's work shows there are species with in a genus that may be very cosmopolitan, found in a wide variety of reef environments, and sibling species that are found only in very localized ecological niches . Research also shows the animals we keep can influence the microbial populations n the water around them and the immune systems can vary significantly between genotypes of a species.

Here's some examples: Flower Pot corals have been a major frustration for aquarists for as long as I've been keeping reef systems, some aquarists successful, a much larger percentage very frustrated, when I got Veron's books I looked up the genus and it turns out theres only a handful of the 20+ species that are found in a wide variety of reef environments and the majority only found in specific ecological niches and maybe preffering a lot of wave action or surprisingly even shunning any direct light and usually found under overhangs, not being able to identify which species or know where it came from doomed many colonies to death at the hands of aquarists who thought they would do well since their other so called "LPS" were doing fine. Acropora microcladoes is an example where tankmates can be a huge factor in wether or not they survive being found only in the company of other acroporas and rarely (<5%) with any other genus of coral (Veron's works lists other species with this same requirement of needing sibling species in close proximity to thrive.)

 

[Shooter6]

I know people use solar sun tubes to light tanks. Those collect the sunlight, direct it down mirrored tubes and into the tank like directional lights we use to light our reefs. Ive never seen any of them use blue plastic to limit the light.

 

[knightnsd]

I think there were a couple youtube videos with some guys running solartubes over their tanks which are basically sky lights.t I think he had some mirrors in them to reflect the sun down into the tank and had corrosion problems. It was a while ago when I was considering a sky light setup since power in California is crazy and I had a 300 gallon tank and it seemed like a greener option but I ended up running leds.

 

[Cory]

Hello what your looking for is a shade cloth called chrominet blue. Also the sun is great for any coral, the bigger problem being temperature and intensity being too much. But id use the sun over any artificial light source.

 

[Shooter6]

Poor =natural ?

He's talking about Ohio for example, more cloudy, days then sunny. Snow cold ect.

 

[Shooter6]

I think there were a couple youtube videos with some guys running solartubes over their tanks which are basically sky lights.t I think he had some mirrors in them to reflect the sun down into the tank and had corrosion problems. It was a while ago when I was considering a sky light setup since power in California is crazy and I had a 300 gallon tank and it seemed like a greener option but I ended up running leds.

Solar tubes have no corrosion issues as they are sealed. Secondly the entire tube is mirrored inside, so the sun light is collected, from all sides, funneled down the tube and exits on the inside of the house. I have 12 on my roof currently. They even pick up moon light and glow purple. One downside is if a car goes buy they pick up the headlights and direct that light into the room, also stormy nights the lightning looks like a flash on your cell phone going off all night.
The newer ones have a wifi shade that can be closed to avoid these issues though.

 

[AquaBiomics]

Obtuse -
a: lacking sharpness or quickness of sensibility or intellect.
b: difficult to comprehend : not clear or precise in thought or expression

Well, I've been called a lot worse.

You're right though, the corals we keep for the most part are collected, in the case of wild corals, or grown, in the case of maricultured corals, at much deeper levels than at the surface. But that's as true for so called SPS as the so called LPS as well as the so called "Softies" Using these terms to collectively denote environmental and nutritional requirements for species that in some cases may not even be found in the same conditions in the wild and may be more distantly related than cats and dogs can only result in unneccessary death of animals and frustration on the part of aquarists. Reffering back to the OP as an example of how this misunderstanding could kill coral as there are certainly so called "SPS" that would die if placed in sunlight even at lower light intensity levels.

Instead of sticking with decades old dogma we need to be looking at the research showing there can be significant differences between sibling species within a genus as well as between genotypes within a species. We also need to be sensitive to research showing how the microbial processes in our systems influence the health of our animals. Veron's work shows there are species with in a genus that may be very cosmopolitan, found in a wide variety of reef environments, and sibling species that are found only in very localized ecological niches . Research also shows the animals we keep can influence the microbial populations n the water around them and the immune systems can vary significantly between genotypes of a species.

Here's some examples: Flower Pot corals have been a major frustration for aquarists for as long as I've been keeping reef systems, some aquarists successful, a much larger percentage very frustrated, when I got Veron's books I looked up the genus and it turns out theres only a handful of the 20+ species that are found in a wide variety of reef environments and the majority only found in specific ecological niches and maybe preffering a lot of wave action or surprisingly even shunning any direct light and usually found under overhangs, not being able to identify which species or know where it came from doomed many colonies to death at the hands of aquarists who thought they would do well since their other so called "LPS" were doing fine. Acropora microcladoes is an example where tankmates can be a huge factor in wether or not they survive being found only in the company of other acroporas and rarely (<5%) with any other genus of coral (Veron's works lists other species with this same requirement of needing sibling species in close proximity to thrive.)

Yeah, the LPS, SPS designations are nonsensical and frustrating. It literally makes as much sense as planning ones vegetable garden based on leaf size.

If we want a two-part classification, the classification we're looking for is Robust vs Complex. If we're comfortable with a little more, the family level offers reasonable ability to generalize (e.g. most corals in the Pocilloporidae have similar requirements).

LPS vs SPS simply doesnt reflect any real biological distinction.

 

[Shooter6]