SantaMonica
Well-known member
A lagoon generally has higher amounts of food particles and lower amounts of nutrients, because of the increased benthic macroalgal coverage, so it is understandable how the coral growth would be more there.
birth of 2 builds totaling 30k gallons
- Thread starter hedgedrew
- Start date
Robb in Austin
New member
Interesting observations.
There was tons of macro algae. All the top of the porites rocks were covered by an alage that looked like gorgonians. One last observation for all of us that use sand or dsb. The amount ofg sea cucumbers in any one area was insane. Like every 2 feet. I will be adding more when I get back.
I might just put back ushio 14k or Hamilton 10k and combine it with radiums like I had but convert one or both of bulbs to 250w from 400 w. I was frying coral with 2 400s like that in each reflector. The ushio has the blue spike already so if I do that I will use 250 w combined with radium and yes I ran the whites for just few hours a day and blues longer. I may change that.
I agree, we definitely run a lot more blue in our tanks than is natural, especially in shallow waters. If you go down to 60 ft or so it starts to look a lot more blue as the red end of the spectrum is near completely gone. Natural reefs like natural spectrum tanks look more washed out though. The colors never pop the same ways which is why most of us go more blue. If you want that more natural look go with plasma lights especially for the big tank. They are designed to exactly mimic natural sunlight.
To piggy back on your previous statement about Tahiti, I noticed an explosion in post settlement larval fish when I was in Aruba back in March. I had never seen this but the reef was literally covered in billions of tiny silvery fish. The dive guide had said that there was a cooling in December and January that led to an upwelling event which brought up the cooler deep water which is full of nutrients. This caused a massive plankton bloom and triggered a mass spawning event. I wonder if something similar happened on the other end of the world.
On the butterfly topic, I really think it is all about getting very young fish and training them over to prepared foods early on when their feeding behaviors are more plastic. Once a fish lives years in the wild and gets accustomed to certain foods, it is stressful to no longer have those foods available. That stress causes a reduction in welfare which ultimately starts the downturn we all see when we try difficult species. I really think the best chance of success is to get small fish in groups and quarantine them with similar species who have already been trained to take prepared foods. Being in groups helps relieve stress in small fish and while feeding behaviors are largely innate, there has to be some aspect which can be learned.
On a side note, I heard you had a conversation with my client Kevin the other night. I have only been back for a little over a year now taking care of his tanks after 10 years living in New Orleans. Every system has its intricacies and every system has a learning curve when you first start them up. I am sure yours new ones will be no exception. If you ever want to pick our brains let us know.
To piggy back on your previous statement about Tahiti, I noticed an explosion in post settlement larval fish when I was in Aruba back in March. I had never seen this but the reef was literally covered in billions of tiny silvery fish. The dive guide had said that there was a cooling in December and January that led to an upwelling event which brought up the cooler deep water which is full of nutrients. This caused a massive plankton bloom and triggered a mass spawning event. I wonder if something similar happened on the other end of the world.
On the butterfly topic, I really think it is all about getting very young fish and training them over to prepared foods early on when their feeding behaviors are more plastic. Once a fish lives years in the wild and gets accustomed to certain foods, it is stressful to no longer have those foods available. That stress causes a reduction in welfare which ultimately starts the downturn we all see when we try difficult species. I really think the best chance of success is to get small fish in groups and quarantine them with similar species who have already been trained to take prepared foods. Being in groups helps relieve stress in small fish and while feeding behaviors are largely innate, there has to be some aspect which can be learned.
On a side note, I heard you had a conversation with my client Kevin the other night. I have only been back for a little over a year now taking care of his tanks after 10 years living in New Orleans. Every system has its intricacies and every system has a learning curve when you first start them up. I am sure yours new ones will be no exception. If you ever want to pick our brains let us know.
Dmorty217
Saltwater Addict
I do remember reading that one of yours died too, have you learned what the secret is to keeping them with the other one?
The pair that lived together was def male female and smaller and larger. Different looking. The ones that didn't get along looked exactly alike. So I guess 2 males or 2 females. Why one died?? Have no idea. I just know one that died was more a coral rock picker and never learned to chase dn food in water column unlike the one I have now.
I just did a dive with black tips and lemon sharks and schools of triggers. Nigers and black surgeon triggers. 50 feet. 15 meters. Ok. Its way bluer down there than the lagoon. The whiter light didn't pennetrate and there was plenty of coral growth. So I maybe wrong on the white light thing. My hunch is they can adapt. I've seen big reefs now in 2 feet of water. Or 50 feet. Still convinced maxima clams like direct sunlight.
dave.m
Active member
The blue light in our aquariums is for the benefit of the corals' algae. The intense near-UV light on some aquariums is to make the corals glow. The white light is for the benefit of human eyes. We see best in the yellow-green segment of the spectrum. How far you want to wander from those approximations on your aquarium is entirely up to you.
Dave.M
Dave.M
Thx Dave. But I think some of the coral in shallow lagoons. Porites hycanthis etc and definitely maxima clams was using some part of white light spectrum also. And as you go futher dn that white light disappears. Leaving blue alone. But the aquarium blue bulbs have 450 light spikes in them many which are 3 to 5x more than white light. But on the reef the white and blue start out the same like day light bulb across spectrum. And we loose white as we go deeper. Not provide more blue. Like the bulbs do. I understand the zoo photo synthesize blue best. But are the 15 to 20k bulbs out there really doing it right??
Robb in Austin
New member
At our local clubs conference last year, James Fatheree spoke and essentially said "give clams as much light as you can if you want them to live". So, yeah I think your observation is spot on.
Hedgedrew, different wavelengths of light are absorbed at different rates as they pass through salt water. The red end of the spectrum is absorbed the fastest. Almost all of it is gone in the first 10m of water. Blue light is absorbed the slowest of all of the photosynthetically active wavelengths of light. For this reason the zooxanthellae responsible for most of the energy in photosynthetic inverts (corals, clams, anemones, etc.) have evolved to use mostly the blue end of the spectrum. Using bulbs that have more blue light provide what the algae and therefore the corals need without a lot of extra light adding heat and wasting energy. Yes the percent of blue light compared to natural sunlight is significantly greater in these bulbs, but still no where close to total amount of blue light in natural sunlight.
There is one more aspect of this which most of us tend to forget. Much of the pigments that corals produce are to protect the tissues and the symbiotic algae from exposure to UV light and some research suggests from high intensity visible spectrum light as well. White light tends to wash out these colors some however when we are viewing them in our tanks.
Light that is too bright could damage corals and increase photosynthesis to levels dangerous for the corals. Ever notice how Xenia pulses faster the brighter the light. I have an idea that pulsing increases exchange rate of water into and out of polyp which helps to transport excess oxygen produced by photosynthesis away from coral tissue. If photosynthesis rates were to get too high in coral tissues then oxygen bubbles would form much like "pearling" on the surface of plants in freshwater planted tanks. These oxygen bubbles in the tissue of the corals would cause tissue damage. This explains why too much light can cause bleaching as the corals expel their zooxanthellae to protect themselves.
I would guess that the extra colors many see from halide lighting is due to the UV produced by halides. When I was working at a public aquarium we had a 6ft deep coral tank lit by four 1000 watt halides. If I didn't get the work done on the tank before the lights came on in the morning I would get a sun burn on my arms from the UV light emitted, happened more than once.
I bet if we added some more UV leds to our setups we could get even more colors out of our corals.
There is one more aspect of this which most of us tend to forget. Much of the pigments that corals produce are to protect the tissues and the symbiotic algae from exposure to UV light and some research suggests from high intensity visible spectrum light as well. White light tends to wash out these colors some however when we are viewing them in our tanks.
Light that is too bright could damage corals and increase photosynthesis to levels dangerous for the corals. Ever notice how Xenia pulses faster the brighter the light. I have an idea that pulsing increases exchange rate of water into and out of polyp which helps to transport excess oxygen produced by photosynthesis away from coral tissue. If photosynthesis rates were to get too high in coral tissues then oxygen bubbles would form much like "pearling" on the surface of plants in freshwater planted tanks. These oxygen bubbles in the tissue of the corals would cause tissue damage. This explains why too much light can cause bleaching as the corals expel their zooxanthellae to protect themselves.
I would guess that the extra colors many see from halide lighting is due to the UV produced by halides. When I was working at a public aquarium we had a 6ft deep coral tank lit by four 1000 watt halides. If I didn't get the work done on the tank before the lights came on in the morning I would get a sun burn on my arms from the UV light emitted, happened more than once.
I bet if we added some more UV leds to our setups we could get even more colors out of our corals.
