What is your ideal reef temperature?

[Daddy-o]

I was reading a bit of "Coral" by Eric Borneman and he was discussing ideal temp. for our reefs and it got me wondering if the 76 degrees I keep my reef at might be too low. Wondering what temp. most reefers aim for? and why?
Cheers! Mark

 

[Flippers4pups]

I’ve been keeping mine at 80 degrees now for around six months. I was battling dinoflagellates for around 5 years. After trying everything in the book to get rid of them, a member suggested raising my temp from 78 up to 80. I did and the Dino’s went away! Of course all this is anecdotal but it did seem to help.

Raising up from 78 to 80 took some time close to a week, but there has been no ill effect since. Matter fact my corals look a lot better. If raising your temp is what you want to do, do it slowly over the course of a day or so.

 

[JustAnotherNanoTank]

78°F. Not on the cold side but not close to the hot side either. Hotter means too much evap for me here in southern Cali.

 

[Daddy-o]

I’ve been keeping mine at 80 degrees now for around six months. I was battling dinoflagellates for around 5 years. After trying everything in the book to get rid of them, a member suggested raising my temp from 78 up to 80. I did and the Dino’s went away! Of course all this is anecdotal but it did seem to help.

Raising up from 78 to 80 took some time close to a week, but there has been no ill effect since. Matter fact my corals look a lot better. If raising your temp is what you want to do, do it slowly over the course of a day or so.

We had a bit of a hot spell and my reef was going from 76 to 85 daily

 

[joseserrano]

Whoa 85.

 

[Bob Weigant]

I’ve always kept mine around 77-78 or so Mark

 

[Bob Weigant]

Whoa 85.

During that heat wave a week ago mine peaked at 89. Lost quite a bit of sps. I thought I had fans in storage but was wrong

 

[pseudorand]

Does anyone know how the ocean fluctuates? I know it's the ocean, but there has to be some shallower reefs where currents or sunlight can change the temp by at least a few degrees in a short time in certain places from time to time. I wonder what species live in places like that.

 

[DivingTheWorld]

79.5-80 is the usual year round temp. But with the extreme heat we’ve had, I’ve been letting it rise to 81 before I turn on the AC.

 

[DivingTheWorld]

During that heat wave a week ago mine peaked at 89. Lost quite a bit of sps. I thought I had fans in storage but was wrong

No Bob!!

 

[Bob Weigant]

No Bob!!

Yeah it was not good and working 14 hours a Day didn’t help at all. Taking a break from sps for awhile. All my lps did just fine

 

[Nigel35]

Generally like to keep mine between 76-80

 

[joseserrano]

During that heat wave a week ago mine peaked at 89. Lost quite a bit of sps. I thought I had fans in storage but was wrong

you may still loose more stuff in the coming weeks.

 

[joseserrano]

Yeah it was not good and working 14 hours a Day didn’t help at all. Taking a break from sps for awhile. All my lps did just fine

Or just buy the appropriate equipment

 

[Daddy-o]

During that heat wave a week ago mine peaked at 89. Lost quite a bit of sps. I thought I had fans in storage but was wrong

Yea, it was toasty. It was 108 in my driveway and I managed to limit the reef in the uninsulated garage to 85 without a chiller or air conditioner. I am going to get a small cheap window a/c to be better prepared in the future.
Cheers! Mark

 

[ReefHomieJon]

Yea, it was toasty. It was 108 in my driveway and I managed to limit the reef in the uninsulated garage to 85 without a chiller or air conditioner. I am going to get a small cheap window a/c to be better prepared in the future.
Cheers! Mark

Chiller>AC

 

[Daddy-o]

Chiller>AC

A chiller is about $900 and an A/C is $149

 

[pseudorand]

Does anyone know how the ocean fluctuates? I know it's the ocean, but there has to be some shallower reefs where currents or sunlight can change the temp by at least a few degrees in a short time in certain places from time to time. I wonder what species live in places like that.

Turns out that yes, some reefs do have higher daily temperature fluctuation, and those are the ones that will survive global warming. Unfortunately the article doesn't talk about specific coral species, but I bet those picky acros are on the going-extinct list.

 

[EMeyer]

Does anyone know how the ocean fluctuates? I know it's the ocean, but there has to be some shallower reefs where currents or sunlight can change the temp by at least a few degrees in a short time in certain places from time to time. I wonder what species live in places like that.

As your post suggests, coral reefs in nature experience a range of different temperature conditions.

Daily or seasonal temperature fluctuations don't seem to affect the species composition of the reef very much (e.g. in the very well studied reefs on American Samoa).

Consistently high or low temperatures have a big impact on species composition. Corals thrive in the hot waters of the Arabian Gulf, but very few species.

Putting aside the unusual extremes, almost all reef building corals exist within a narrow temperature range of about 24-28°C (75-85°F). I like 26°C (78.8°F), which is close to the annual average for most reefs I've studied.

I use fans on a temperature controller to cool my tanks to this level, its all I need as long as we turn on the AC when its hot out.

 

[lavoisier]

I set my controllers to a low of 76 (heaters on) and a high of 78 (heaters off). During the warmer months I fluctuate between 77.5 and 79.2 with an average of 78.2. My tank is in the basement so ambient temps are cooler.