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Home      Reply		Viewed: 237 -- Replies: 8
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Posted	Corals vs Lighting
17-05-2006 19:33 by tommy	Hi can you tell me what corals will live under 2 marine white tubes and 2 mainre blue tubes
17-05-2006 19:34 by tommy	i no halide would be better but i dnt have the money same with T5
17-05-2006 19:36 by wayne	what type t8 {normal 1" tube) or t5 linier or t5 compact what is the combined wattage?
17-05-2006 19:44 by tommy	ok ... 2 30w and 2 15w which are t8s
17-05-2006 19:44 by tommy	or r they 36 w .. 36w yes defo
17-05-2006 21:10 by wayne	not really strong enough , tubeworms will be ok ,maybe polyps and mushrooms as well
17-05-2006 21:25 by tommy	is that about it
17-05-2006 22:54 by minalo1	Hi tommy, three things I would say regarding lighting spectrum, intensity, photo-period, every situation is slightly different and the variables of your set up, so this is only a very basic offering, (photo-period) the day length should be between 10 to 12 hours not longer than 12. as far as intensity goes this I will leave to you (not copping out) because the right intensity of the light source depends on the type of animals kept as well as the type of reef you have in your aquarium, some corals are better under flouresent lighting and some under intense metal halide, try this site : http://www.commercial-lamps.co.uk/acatalog/Aquarium_Lights.html again differences of opinon are almost daily so all I will offer is try to choose lamps that roughly mimic daylight or slightly higher, also lamps that utilize more of the red spectra may enhance the look of your fish but can also create more algae growth. last bit always change your bulbs what ever they are every 12 months as past this the bulb can with age change its spectrum. there's a lot of bulbs out there but finding the right choice is difficult, if your thinking of keeping corals I would suggest changing your bulbs towards the blue end of the spectrum (above 5000k) roughly 1 blue watt to 1 white/daylight watt on tanks using flouresents as the kelvin rating increases the more blue or atnic , if you get metal halides later as well change to a high Kelvin with blue spectra and shorten the time on, and use the floresents just for the morning and evening time instead of the halide so you get that gradual build replicating a daylight pattern. there's alot out there and conflicting advice all the time above is only a very basic guide and perhaps others here can enhance on what I have said, but lights arn't cheap and running them properly isn't either. I would ask you to do some research on corals first lighting is really important but also so is water chemistry, getting the right balance is so important and also keeping that balance, because it is easy to get the set up wrong and you not only loose the corals but also fish or even crash the whole tank. As far as recommending corals, try gorgonians in particular the encrusting gorgonian Erythropodium caribaeorum good luck
18-05-2006 09:56 by Alan	In simple terms this is what I managed when using 5 T8 tubes 3 white 2 blue on a 3 foot long tank depth of 2 foot. At about 12" depth I had thriving leather corals and pussey coral also yellow polyps at about 18inches depth as well as these you can get away with mushroom anemones the more flourescent mushrooms are better as these are from a greater depth avoid blue mushrooms as generally these require metal halide illumination. Ultimately you would be better off saving up for a lighting upgrade to at least T5's or even better still a 250 w metal halide. www.marine-lighting.co.uk is a good place to look for aquabays. These are far cheaper than the usual pendents.

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