Re: My PAR
jroovers link said:
[quote author=Darryl_V link=topic=3765.msg33164#msg33164 date=1355274869]
[quote author=jroovers link=topic=3765.msg33162#msg33162 date=1355274310]
[quote author=Darryl_V link=topic=3765.msg33158#msg33158 date=1355270910]
depends on what you hope to achieve ....with those numbers I think your in SPS tank territory.
I also have a theory that tanks with higher nutrients could use a bit more par and tanks with lower nutrients can get by with a bit less comparably.
Intuitively that seems backwards to me. Not saying you are wrong, I would have guessed less nutrients in the tank = higher reliance on light for photosynthisizing food. More nutrients = less reliance on light for food. That said, starved corals that are already pale would certainly bleach out faster under relativley higher lighting.
[/quote]When I say high nutrients I just mean nitrate and phosphate which the coral doesnt use but the zoo-x does.
The problem is the the zoo-x over populating the coral under high nutrient. We all know high light can bleach a coral, which is loss of zoo-x, and high nutrient can brown coral which is an abundance of zoo-x. So in certain cases they can work against each other.
Ask Bill about the tank at RR.....20ppm NO3 and .8ppm PO4 I believe. Also super high lighting and great colours on SPS.
[/quote]
Maybe I'll jack my lighting down even a bit further. I don't run mine very long though, 12 hours for LEDs and 6 hours for T5s. Anyhow, interesting discussion. I can't believe RR has a SPS tank with great colours and those parameters.
[/quote]I think that might be Jays secret. High nutrients, high light. But not something that can be easily duplicated in a display tank seeing as his frag tank is super shallow and he has 2 x 400w MH and T5's really close to the surface of the water. It would be interesting to see what the par is in that tank.
I just thought of maybe a better way to describe what Im trying to get to...
high nutrients and/or low light = brown corals
low nutrients and/or high light = pale corals
high light + high nutrients = nice corals
low light + low nutrients = nice corals
Haha...its almost like math. Of course this is only applies to a small degree and is my theory. ie no amount of light is going to colour up sticks when NO3 reaches 50ppm and PO4 is 2ppm