lighting question

[jhrivera]

Hello all! I'm starting up a SW FO aquarium for the first time and I was thinking of purchasing a Coralife 30W 2-bulb Retrofit Kit with one 10,000K 30W Daylight bulb and one 30W blue actinic bulb. Since it's only going to be a FO tank, is this appropriate lighting, or do I need something more powerful (more Watts)?

[gcvt]

How big is the tank?

[jhrivera]

It's a 50g tank. I'm only planning to have 4 to 5 fish (2 perculas, a firefish and a flame angelfish), about 50 lbs of live rock, 2-3 inch deep live sand bed, and a few cleaners (shrimp, crabs, snails).

[gcvt]

That should work. For a fish-only tank, you really only need enough light to see the fish.

[Corax]

That will work for the fish, cuz Greg is right, all you need is what makes YOU happy for a FO system...

But the coraline (the purple stuff) on the live rock is going to suffer in such a low light environment. The rule of thumb for live rock is 2-3 wpg if you want it to stay nice and pretty. The actual function of the rock will not be impacted by the coraline dying of, but your tank's appearance will be.

[OrionGirl]

I don't agree--I've seen tank with 1.5 watts light/gallon with lovely coralline growth. It won't spread as rapidly, but coralline will grow without high lighting. Complete darkness and being buried results in discoloration, though not always death. We had coralline covering the rocks in the octopus tank, and we just had a standard strip light on that. Corals and green stuff is a different story.

[Corax]

I've actually seen it go both ways. I've seen low light (standard strip lighting) tanks have nice coralline and I've seen em have bad coralline. Alot of it depends on how high the calc levels are. One thing is for certain, good lighting and good calc always gives nice coralline, so I try to go that route if at all possible =)

[VoodooChild]

I have a 20" quad light over my 30 and and the far corners of the tank where there is no light the algae is white, then a light pink, darker purple, until right underneath it's bright green. Just thought I'd throw in my .2!

[cathy]

just another newbie trying to get things straight... with a 30 watt daylight, and a 30 watt actinic, that's 60 watts total for the 50 gal system..... so that's only about 1.2 watts per gallon, right? (just want to make sure I can do the math right for my own system).

Now suppose this person changes their mind and decides to try their hand at some of the easier inverts. (I am thinking of this for my own system which is fish only for now.) How much wattage per gallon would you all recommend, and could you give a breakdown (proportionally) as to the source (daylight vs actinic)?

[VoodooChild]

It really depends on what you want to keep. Most inverts are just fine without lighting. This includes crabs, shrimps, feather dusters, etc. The only things you'd need to worry about lighting for is corals, anenomes, and clams. And then it gets pretty $pendy. I'm not too sure about the ratio for full spectrum vs. actinic, so I'll let someone else chime in here.

[cathy]

ok, maybe it'd help if I told you what I was thinking of. I am thinking of soft corals (not hard) and have been doing my research; I definitely want to try my hand at the easy end of the spectrum. so some likely candidates are:
Pachyclavularia sp (starburst polyp)
Xenia sp
Sarchophyton sp ( Toadstool Mushroom Leather coral)
Lobohphyton sp (Devils' Hand Leather coral)
Other members of the family want an anenome; I know these have more stringent requirements, so these are last on my list. And if I do, the Pacific anenomes are ruled out; have read that the Carribean species are the only ones that should be attempted by a beginner.

So please chime in with what you all think the lite requirements should be for these beasties (differentiating the soft corals from the anenome, if there's a significant difference in minimum requirements.) Be as specific as you can - I like numbers! thanks all.

[Corax]

Ok, the corals sound like some decent starter stuff with the possible exception of the polyps.. I'm not familiar with "starburst polyps" but if you mean sun polyps, those are a bit more difficult to keep going.

Anemone..... Having kept a BTA first under dual 175w halides and now under dual 96w powerquad compact fluorescents, I can tell you that despite what the Dr. Ron's of the world like the claim, these critters are VERY dependant on light and light proximity is critical.

I got my Bubble tip about a year ago after building a hood mostly to house this one critter. I HAD to have an anemone! So I put my 175w halides over him and it sat there, and sat there, annnnd sat there.. I fed it, it grew a bit, never more than 10% probably. It always looks drab, never full and rubust like the ones I'd seen in pictures. So, after giving up on the idea of having a reef tank and deciding to focus mostly on the fish, I decided to lose the hot halides and go with Powerquads. It was a step down in wattage, so I of course was worried sick about the BTA. I'd already made arrangements with my LFS to take it off my hands in a hurry. Well, I installed my quads and fired it up! He still looked drab, but he didn't eject his guts so I assumed all was well... After about a week, I noticed how fat it was getting.. After about 2 weeks, I was astonished that the little 2" BTA I'd had for a year had opened up to almost 3" across! After a few weeks, I decided a new hood was in order cuz I'd grown tired of the old one which was primarily a halide system. The quads were about 10" off the water and looked kind of dim. So, I bought this little dealie from Wal-Mart that is a pretty sleek lookin hood and built myself a couple boxes to put the lights in. This put the quads no more than 2" off the water surface.... Kinda warm, still working on a fan idea, but it's managable. Well, my BTA frickin exploded overnight. I came home the next day to a sprawling expanse of tentacles that were easily 4" across and VERY healthy looking. Needless to say, this was a huge step for my BTA...

It's been about 4 months since my switch from halide to pc and about 3 weeks since the lights were moved closer and the BTA is now a whopping 5-6" across and it takes 10-20 silver sides per week! Suffice to say that the quads have made a HUGE difference in that critter.

I'm not trying to write a testimonial to powerquad lighting (but I guess I have, yer welcome Custom Sealife, please send my endorsment check ASAP..), but instead I'm trying to convey to you how important the correct lighting is for these critters. Yes, your anemone might live under less than optimal lighting, but I doubt very seriously that it will thrive and reach its full potential.

Do the right thing and wait until both you AND your tank are ready to handle the more sensitive critters...

[cathy]

I believe I am doing the right thing - reading, researching, collecting opinions, and planning BEFORE I make a move. That's why I'm here on this board.
what I gleaned from your response is that you had good luck with anenomes after switiching to 2 96 watt compact fluroescents. (192 watts total?) How many gallons is your tank? Now here is where my ignorance bleeds through - what type of lighting is provided by the compact flourescents in terms of wavelength - do you get any blue light, or is it like super strong daylight? Maybe at that strength it doesn't matter?
Now leaving the anenomes aside, for the other soft corals I mentioned, what lighting would anyone recommend?
As far as the Pachyclavularia is concerned, I will have to double check my books, but I do believe its distinct from the sun polyps. Will double check that. One book I have plus an online reference described this as either being easy to keep or good for a beginner. Anybody else have further info about this? thanks all

[Corax]

it's a 55g tank and the bulbs are 50/50 smartlights. Meaning half actinic and half daylight.