Mixed reef lighting "advice please"

[DanSavesTheDay]

Hello reefers

Recently I aquaired some sps and zoas from someone running low lights and they aren't very happy on my sandbed. I have no way to contact the person to ask about his lighting conditions.

Over the past 2 weeks the 3 small sps are expelling brown zoo on a daily basis and an armor of god zoa colony which had a very long neck when I received them is expelling zoo on a daily basis and has lost some color.

The other 3 zoa colony do not seem to be expelling much zooxanthellae or to degrees of being unnoticeable.


I would like to note the upper portion of my tank is sps frags which came from someone who ran high intensity light and I do not want to starve them of light.


Should I lower the white intensity down?

Can I lower the intensity in a certain area by covering the top with something? "I can't fit anymore rock"

40 gallon breeder
Eggcrate top
16" 15/16 deep
1" sand bed
Viparspectra 165w
50% blue 27% white
4 hours White/12 hours Blue/ 12 hours in total "I've been told to keep the cycle as long as it is for the sps frags towards the top of my tank"
Calcium 460
Magnesium 1350
Alk 7 "raising it slowly"
Ammonia 0
Nitrate 0
Nitrite 0
phosphate "less than 0.25"

Thank you for any advice

 

[Big G]

I put layers of plastic/fiberglass window screening on the top of my QTs when acclimating. Usually start with 3 or 4 layers and then take on off every 3-4 days or so depending on the corals response.

 

[DanSavesTheDay]

Forgot to add my lights are 10" above the water level

 

[dantimdad]

With those, the recommended distance is 12-14"