coralline algae

im goinig to buy some fiji rocks and it have purple coralline algae on the live rocks. I have a freshwater coralife aqualight compact fluorescent strip light with double strip lights rated 6700k,96watt daylight was for a planted aquarium and it doesnt have an actinic light . i would like to know if i could use this same compact strip light without having any actinic light for the fiji rocks to grow the purple coralline algae . Do i really need a MH lights to grow purple coralline algae in my tank?

 

The short answer is NO
Coralline will grow under NO lights.

Jim

 

A good water flow with high strontium and calcium levels are the main ingredients to thriving corraline algae. Lighting should be ok as long as the bulb is FULL-SPECTRUM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

You running a skimmer ? and no M/H will slow its growth Skimmer will pull their spores out also.. Like mentioned Strontium Ca and dkh and low light are what I find to make it go.. I won't add a coral until I see the corallines getting started as they are a great barometer as to the tanks water quality..

 

coraline algae growth

Im going to purchase a 48" compact floresecnt fixture from Aquatraders and the spec is 2x65w cf-12000k bulb,2x65w cf actinic blue true 03 bulb with 4 blue moon lights. I like to know is this the right lighting fixture for good purple algae growth on my fiji rock? i dont want to loose the purple!! right now im running a MH on my 27 gallon tank and i see spots of purple growth algaes around my tank and the fiji rocks are not loosing its purple algae. the spots of purple i see around my tank is this the good coralline algaes? How about the MH do i really need one!! and would the compact floresecent fixture im going to purchase going to do the same job with good growth purple algae!

 

actually coraline will grow with no light but lighting increases growth!

 

coralline on the back of the tank

I have something interesting, coralline is growing very well in my tank but I have noticed that the top quarter of the back wall of the tank does not have coralline algae. Why is that? Any ideas? There is a perfect line where there is coralline below full of it, above nothing. I have metal halides in my system.
Any comments will be appreciate.

 

I too have great coralline growth directly below and around my 20K MH, but on the far sides there isn't any to speak of. Also, my LR all comes from an LFS that has an un-lit curing tank. In the store there's NO visible coralline growth, but after a few days under my halide they come to life. My experience is telling me that they need good lighting, and a lot of blue.

 

Its the line probably where the actinic blues hits the best , but it will creep up wards. If people did not rinse their sand of all the elements in the dust and did not add a skimmer that remove the algae spores and got their Ca and alk and Magnesium up to proper levels and just ran actinic for several weeks after seeding the corallines then they would have problems with corallines and learn to hate the stuff. Also it always starts in the bottom of a tank then works its way up wards to the lights. Reason for starting in the lower portions is the water filters out the red and green spectrum and the blue is stronger there.