To moonlight or not to moonlight?

[sculpin01]

Coral spawning is directly correlated with moon phase. There is extensive literature detailing this.

In terms of the Apex moonlights being too bright/wrong color, for the coral spawning systems run by Dr. Jamie Craggs, they replaced the blue led diodes with Warm Whites and then put a ping pong ball over the light as a diffuser/lux limiter.

 

[OpieHssn]

On my 50g I run a really faint moonlight from about 4:30am until 7am when the lights start to ramp up, then again from 6pm until about 10:30pm. The lights are low enough that all the night life comes out and the fish go to bed but lets me enjoy the tank a bit more during my waking hours. I have a pair of AI Prime 16s which have a more natural white moonlight. Since the moonlight is for me I don't activate the lunar phase option.

My 10g nano is a different case. I have a yasha goby that seems to panic in full darkness so moonlights on all night. Corals don't seem to mind so far so if my fish needs a nightlight she gets a nightlight! The light on this tank is a Spectra Aqua Knight V2 so no dedicated moonlight, I just put the blue on low.

How low do u put blue on? blue only or both with violet? Been using the same product and try to make moonlight, but 1% of blue only is still too bright.

 

[Calm Blue Ocean]

How low do u put blue on? blue only or both with violet? Been using the same product and try to make moonlight, but 1% of blue only is still too bright.

I have just blue at 5%. Corals and inhabitants all seem to go through night type behaviors at this intensity so I haven't tried it any lower.