SLUF681
Well-Known Member
Just a little update folks. Matt brought my LEDs about 2 or 3 weeks ago and set it up on my 40 breeder mixed reef. Previously, it had a 250W 20,000k metal halide in an Icecap pendant. My LED fixture is 20" long, with 11 whites (channel 1), 15 blues (Channel 3), 6 UVs, 1 red, 1 green (UV, red, and green-channel 5).
I have chosen to use Lat/Lon for moon phase, sunrise, and sunset times. My lights come on at sunrise, and off at sunset. I have a sunrise and sunset, not just "off" and "on". The moon phase is AWESOME, but it takes some getting used to. By that I mean, you walk into your living room and the tank is DARK (no light whatsoever) and you start too freak out, only to realize it's a new moon outside, as well as in your tank! The whole time you're thinking your lights quit!
Let's get to the good stuff. The coral growth/happiness. I had a few frags that weren't doing so well. Well, they are now! My blue candy canes that have just always been little blue lumps on a stick, are now big blue doughnuts lumped together in a big ball. There's about 15-20 heads that you can no longer see into the colony. I had 2 very nice purple monti caps that had (I thought) died. I just noticed they've got a few polyps extended and have started encrusting and plating. My metallic green star polyps have NEVER had the extension they do now. My Miami Hurricane chalices had lost their pretty color and started to recede. They are now startingto color back up and are nice and "plump". I have a Tri-color Valida frag that had started to turn an ugly brownish color. The beautiful green and purple are now back! A war coral frag I had, had receded to the point I thought it would never make it. It has however started making a comeback.
Please understand that by describing all the colors I don't mean I put the LEDs on there, blasted them with blue, and yelled Eureka!
As many of my closest reefer friends can attest, I've always said you'd have to pry my halides out of my cold, dead hands. Well, apparently I'm dead! I can't say I'llbe going back to halides!
I have chosen to use Lat/Lon for moon phase, sunrise, and sunset times. My lights come on at sunrise, and off at sunset. I have a sunrise and sunset, not just "off" and "on". The moon phase is AWESOME, but it takes some getting used to. By that I mean, you walk into your living room and the tank is DARK (no light whatsoever) and you start too freak out, only to realize it's a new moon outside, as well as in your tank! The whole time you're thinking your lights quit!
Let's get to the good stuff. The coral growth/happiness. I had a few frags that weren't doing so well. Well, they are now! My blue candy canes that have just always been little blue lumps on a stick, are now big blue doughnuts lumped together in a big ball. There's about 15-20 heads that you can no longer see into the colony. I had 2 very nice purple monti caps that had (I thought) died. I just noticed they've got a few polyps extended and have started encrusting and plating. My metallic green star polyps have NEVER had the extension they do now. My Miami Hurricane chalices had lost their pretty color and started to recede. They are now startingto color back up and are nice and "plump". I have a Tri-color Valida frag that had started to turn an ugly brownish color. The beautiful green and purple are now back! A war coral frag I had, had receded to the point I thought it would never make it. It has however started making a comeback.
Please understand that by describing all the colors I don't mean I put the LEDs on there, blasted them with blue, and yelled Eureka!
As many of my closest reefer friends can attest, I've always said you'd have to pry my halides out of my cold, dead hands. Well, apparently I'm dead! I can't say I'llbe going back to halides!
