Lighting Help

JRADD87 · Feb 18, 2020

Good afternoon. Reaching out for help regarding lighting options for my 9 gallon Fluval flex. Looking to keep it simple and use a par 38 style bulb with a lamp and timer. looking for specifics regarding what spectrum of colors are best to use. Posting some examples of the various lights i'm looking into. open to suggestions. Thanks.

https://www.rapidled.com/12-led-par38-bulb-actinic/

Birdbrains? · Feb 18, 2020

It sounds like really low PAR output, depending on your goals

Do you plan to grow anything there or is the lighting just for fish / liverock?

JRADD87 · Feb 18, 2020

Birdbrains? said:
It sounds like really low PAR output, depending on your goals Do you plan to grow anything there or is the lighting just for fish / liverock?

planning on eventually adding some soft corals, Still reading up and learning as I am new to the hobby.

Birdbrains? · Feb 20, 2020

Good plan

I believe that at least common softies like Pachyclavularia, or green star polyps, can grow in 30-50 par settings, so perhaps 38 par isn't so bad as I thought

I keep an anemone and I use ocean revive in order to give around 300 par easily so I was thinking 38 was way too little ..but, as I said, I don't even keep corals.

I use a Kessil a80 on a livefood nano, as far as I can read online, the Kessil gives around 40-70 in the middle and 30-50 along the edges of the tank. I have a snip of zoanthus sociatus in that tank, but I cannot tell you if they are growing because I am testing how low temperatures they can take, so they are neither growing nor doing awesome atm.

The higher spectrum whites can look less inviting than the lower and warmer whites so usually people prefer a mix of whites to soften up the look. If you get corals from deep water, generally they are used to bluish light. The stuff from shorelines, like long tentacle anemones, are used to more direct sunlight and might require more whites.

Good luck, oh and one more advice; remember that wild caught fishes may die if you look at them funny so their chances are better in gigantic sized tanks... To spare yourself the pain, go for tank-raised fishes, they are way more easy to domesticate and a joy to keep