Light and too much light.

[gareth.hubbarde]

I'm trying to gauge how much light my tank should get by increasing the led lights gradually. I'm currently at 50% reef white and 80% fiji purple led strips.
If there was too much light would corals react or would they do normal things and just get burnt like idiot humans in the sun?
Trying to work out reactions if there woukd be any. At the moment mushroom at the bottom is fully open and looking good, zoa cluster is all open and looking good, xenia at top and bottom all open and waving. Acan looking fab with mouth open. Also my small garden at the bottom is all open. If the light was too much would they close, or just bleach?

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[Tripod1404]

Some LPS corals stop puffing if they receive too much light. But I have also seen them get bleached while looking otherwise normal. So if you see any color-fading, stop increasing light intensity.

 

[gareth.hubbarde]

Some LPS corals stop puffing if they receive too much light. But I have also seen them get bleached while looking otherwise normal. So if you see any color-fading, stop increasing light intensity.

Thanks for that, will be keeping an eye on things. Would same apply to softs or would they just not open?

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[Ron Reefman]

I've found zoas and soft corals don't need as much light as sps, but they also seem to be able to acclimate to very high levels of light as well.

I have a mostly sps tank and run my 3w & 5w led fixture at 90% on 2 blue channels and 40% on the white channel. My sps are happy. But I put a couple of small zoa colonies on a tonga rock that is very close to the surface of the water and under the light. One colony hasn't changed and is growing well. The other has morphed from green to sky blue and is also growing well. Coral buyers always want some of the blue zoas and then I show them what they look like under more typical light (150 PAR) and they buy the green version because it's cheap!