Blacklight and coral

[chunksofpoooo]

i cant believe it, but im actually thinking about getting an acrylic nano for a single stomatopod (some LR too). Im thinking of creating some type of hood for the tank with two types of light fixture; one with a regular fluorescent bulb, and another with either a blacklight or redlight bulb. I heard that most inverts cant see redlight/blacklight but im not sure with a Mantis shrimp. I figure that the mantis shrimp will be more active at night and considering im up late anyways i want some type of lighting that wont disturb the normal day/night cycle but still allow me to view the active Stomatopod. Im probably gonna keep it w/ crushed coral (i wonder if the blacklight will illuminate the coral?).

Any advice or ideas would be great (fabrication, examples, product names, whatever) If im gonna go w/ redlight can anyone tell me where i can find a blackroom light (like for photography)?


*edit note*
i just remembered that most mantis shrimp arent active at night, but id still like to have some sort of light running while im up

 

[jessie]

i got a regular blacklight bulb for my 28 a couple days ago. it makes my live sand look a really dark purple, not glowing purple, but just really dark, and its normally white. it makes the purple coraline algae look ok, but the really cool thing is that there are all kinds of bright orange swirls on the live rock. i have noticed that my worm and my porcelain crab wont come out with the blacklight on though. when i put one on my big tank, some of the coral glows a really cool green.

i just bought one of the standard 18 inch blacklights from walmart. it illuminates any particles in the water also. so it kinda makes the water cloudy in my 28, but its still cycling too. so i dont know if it will clear up later on or not. i dont run mine very much though. just for a bit after lights out and when i wake up in the middle of the night to check for stuff hiding, thats when the worm sucks back in the hole.

 

[mogurnda]

Blacklight: Most invertebrates see a lot better in the UV than we do.
Red light: Would work for many arthropods, mantis happen to have incredibly broad spectral sensitivity. If you can see them, they can probably see you.