Lighting question?

[parkavenuereef]

What would happen if i don't run my halides for a day to simulate cloudy days?

 

[bosborn1]

Thats a new one. I don't believe I have ever heard that question...I have always heard that you can go a day or two with out the high intensity lighting such in the case of a power failure. I know when I moved my tank I didn't have the lights working for almost two days and nothing died. Very interesting...I would love to hear the theory behind this line of thinking. I am always looking for a more natural method of keeping my tank....Come to think of it I think if you use a moving rail system you obscure some corals at different points from getting direct light due to shadows. So maybe you are on to something. I would post this question in the advance topics forum on RC. I would love to hear what Calfo has to say about this.

Scott

 

[fat-tony]

i've scene several posts about the lights being off a day. someone actually did it fairly regularly. they sasid for the polyp extension was much more defined the next couple days

 

[SVXH6]

i personally do this, and have been doing this for about 8 months now(maybe a little longer).. i have noticed a significant difference in the expansion of corals LPS, and anemones, the day after.. i do this once a month..overall everything in the tank seems to look a little better after this..

 

[Blugobi]

I have also read a few interesting bits about this, If I'm not mistaken most SPS/LPS corals build there skeleton at night while gathering nutrients during the daylight hours. So by simulating a cloudy day may be beneficial to all corals. Lets face it, not every day on tropical reef is 100% sunshine.

 

[dalbrecht]

Cloudy days are part of the native habitat of these organisms. It really can't do all that much harm (they do survive hurricanes after all). It can also probably help the corals dispense of any excess oxygen they may have built up under intense lighting.

I'd say try it once or twice and report back what you experienced. Some photo evidence from the day before and the days after would be helpful.

 

[parkavenuereef]

well today I did the one day of no halides and straight 10hours of vho actinics only.. I noticed that my acro's seem to have some new growth tonight, and my blasto's seem to be tiny and bearly opened. tommarow back to normal to see what the colors looks like. so far so good... also for whatever reason my skimmer went crazy and pulled out a full overflowing collection of black nasty sewage. alot more than normal for sure.. i'll keep everyone posted tommarow on my findings.

 

[SVXH6]

when i do this i give the tank no light at all..

 

[parkavenuereef]

Well softies look better except for the blasto's... they seem mad as hell.. acro's look the same, maybe some growth was added since it... What i saw a difference was n the extension of its feeds today from any other day with the lights on.. so maybe this is a good thing.. i'll post some pics soon!

 

[moriartiholmes]

I'm not sure if I would want to try this...
But if you want to do it, this timer might be an economical way to go.
http://www.hellolights.com/tmditi.html

 

[dalbrecht]

Moriartiholmes,

I think Once per week might be a bit frequent. How often do tropical reefs get cloudy days?

 

[chrisguy]

From time to time I will shut off the MH for a full day, but on a weekly basis, I will have them come on an hour or two later or turn off an hour or two early. Rarely I will shut them off for a couple hours mid day.

It's just my little way of sharing a cloudy day with the contents of my aquarium

 

[jamesonkh]

What about the opposite? Sometimes I forget to switch off my actinics at night, so there's a full days cycle of light with no night/cloudy day at all. Then, when I wake up in the morning, I can't amke everything dark - so I just conduct the regular lighting cycle. What type of effect might this have?

 

[moriartiholmes]

I didn't mean to suggest having the lights off for an entire day. With that timer, I meant you could have varying photoperiods.
For example, if you normally run your halides for 8 hours, you could have a day where they run for 5 or 6 hours and another day where they run for 9 hours.

 

[moriartiholmes]

jamesonkh, I don't know the entire answer to that question, but I know it's bad to leave your lights on overnight. The zooanthale can produce excess oxygen in the form of O1, which is highly reactive and toxic (also one of the many theories why Xenia pulse). Additionally, they can produce excess sugars, which I know I've read is bad, but honestly don't know why. In a worst-case scenario, it could cause the coral to expel its zooanthale to rid itself of the toxin source.