Interesting Light Information

So I just went to World Wide Corals for their Black Friday sale. I needed some T5 bulbs, so I asked them what would be a good bulb combo, since I only have a 2 bulb fixture. They said to just use 2 actinics, which surprised me. So I asked them how my growth would be with corals, so they showed me one of their display tanks.

It was only running 4 actinic bulbs, with no other lights that were about 2 feet above the tank. The tank was somewhere around 400-500 gallons and was somewhere between 24-26 inches deep. Surprisingly enough, they've had great growth with LPS and SPS in the tank, so I decided to buy 2 Giesemann actinic+ bulbs.

I then asked another worker if I could grow Birdsnests with the bulbs. He told me that they should do fine in my tank, and that he successfully kept some Birdsnests under PC bulbs for a while before upgrading This came as a shock to me. He then told me that I should be able to keep Monti's, Birdsnests, and Stylo's without a problem, maybe even some lower light Acros, if I put it near the very top of my tank. I decided to buy a Green Birdsnest. It's already doing great with good polyp extension not even a half hour after I put it in the tank, despite everything that's happened with my tank recently.

I just thought I'd share

 

Bump

 

how big were the 4 actinic bulbs each?

 

I believe they were 72 inch bulbs.

 

Power Compacts.



Power Compacts, my first large reef tank 1996.



Yep way before LED's we did a decent job of keeping reef tanks.
Yes I love some T5HO fixtures and hybrid LED/MH/T5.

You can certainly keep nice tanks under power compacts.

I appreciate the fact that someone gave you decent advice and was not trying to sell you instead.

 

The corals will survive and look great under T5 actinics but you will not see much if any growth.

 

Do you mean not as much growth or very little growth?

 

That's a very beautiful tank, Corailline

 

I know it's not examples of T5 but it does show you do not need to buy into the hype to be happy. Power compact are fine for clams, a lot of sps and LPS loved them.

Thank you.

 

It really depends on the bulbs temperature and intensity.
As long as they produce the intensity needed in the 400-700nm range. One thing to keep in mind is this; reputable lamp manufacturers produce lamps for coral growth in three Kelvin temperatures, 10K, 14K, and 20K. Interestingly enough, they all have very close to the same amount of 'blue' in them .The difference in the higher Kelvin lamps is that there are less phosphors used that emit the red, yellow, and green light, and that is why they appear bluer. There are lamp manufacturers that may add more blue in their higher Kelvin temperature lamps, in some cases by as much as three times the amount , but there is always some reduction of the red, yellow, and green. This is the reason why some manufacturers 10K lamps will differ in appearance from other manufacturers 10K lamps. Actinic lights vary by manufacturer as well.-Bob Fenner
Also one more consideration is the fish; reef fish do need some "real" light. Something along the lines of 1/3 regular and 2/3 actinic would be much better IMO.