15o w halides w/ actinics sufficient for all SPS?

150w halides w/ actinic pcs sufficient to keep high light demanding sps with smaller polyps?

My lighting is 5" above the water
I have ORA birdsnest growing very well 16" from the light. Would a higher light demandin sps such as an acro turaki do good 12" from light?

an lfs told me that the verys small polyp sps wont do too well under 150w halides in general. I didnt go into detail with height of the lights. They use 1000w halides about 4 feet above the water (corals 4-6" under water. How powerful are the 1000w halides when the coral is more then 4 feet away compared to 150w with coral 1 foot away?

 

i think you would be all rite as long you keep up on changing your lamps reg. i mean i would try it. the frist ten years in this hobby is experimental any way. just kidding. another thing once i bought a digitata that was rasied under a more powerful light than what i had and i ended up giving it to a friend becouse it was dying and it came back under his light. just find a way to give it to some one who can take care of it if it doesnt look like its going to make it.

 

I have a sunpod with 2 150 watt 20,000K hqi bulbs. My 5 inch birdsnest is aobut 10 inches under the bulb and doing good. It does have some algae on some of the tips but this is not from the lighting I believe. I think I fed to much for a few days. They are not the easiest sps coral. I have a montipora who does great 10 inches under. I dont get much growth out of them but thats probably because of the 20,000K bulb.
ADam

I have no acinics on mine either. As long as your water params are good your birdsnest should not die. But you willl want to feed the tank lightly or they do get algae on them quite easily

 

Advanced Aquarist Lighting

 

I think you will find that it will live and grow, but, it may not become as colorful as most people like to see.

 

What are the dimensions of your aquarium?

 

dimensions of my tank are 60" long 18" wide and 20" tall. I am not planning on keeping sps everywhere. The birdsnest i have is doing great. Fastest growing coral i have right now. Heres approx 1 month of growth:


Grows like a tree!

I also have a stylopora that lost a lot of color and isnt growing. I moved it much closer to the light a week ago. Hopefully that makes it better. I have an acro that hasn't grown and has lost color. Iv had it for a month. Maybe its just got adjusted and will get better? It is 16" away from light, ill leave it alone for now.

 

Advanced Aquarist's Online Magazine - Lateral Lines: Classification and Terminology For Reef Aquarium Lighting

get a par meter

also, lighting is just a small portion of keeping sps's

 

nice articles. Loving the charts. Ill look into a par meter.

 

Where to start...As reef guru brought up, a very significant element is that light remains just one of the many key ingredients in maintaining a reef aquarium.
150 watt bulbs may in fact be a suitable choice for most corals, even SPS'. The keys to ideal lighting incorporate terms such as PAR, PUR and supersaturation. Also, the amount of turbidity, dissolved inorganics and organics will also play a part in the amount of light available to corals and other symbiotic animals. Often times we have sufficient light but the color of the coral may not be the same as that where we saw the coral before we purchased it.
Calcium, is a very critical issue when it comes to growth! This combined with the aspects of maintaining a balanced alkalinity and pH level will help to ensure that corals will grow by being able to deposit/precipitate a calcareous skeleton.
Without getting to verbose right now, I will stop and leave some fine reading to you to educate yourself further, but hopefully I steered you in the right direction.
Good luck!