Please help!! Need advice on lighting.

[iheartgobies]

Hello everyone! I have a 40 gallon cube, and I’m struggling with successfully keeping corals. Im currently running an AI Prime HD and was wondering if anyone has a good preset recommendation. I made my lighting schedule by myself (Ill attach an image, I know it’s probably pretty bad don’t make fun lol). I recently picked up a large colony of birdsnest, so I turned my lighting up a little and ended up bleaching my monti plate. (Which was my favourite, I’m heartbroken.) Now my birdsnest is losing color and turning white as well. All my other corals seem to be okay but not really growing. My tank is about a year old. Any advice- related to lighting or not- would be super appreciated!!

 

[Ron Reefman]

Turn down the UV and violet. A very small amount of that spectrum goes a long way to make fluorescing corals look cool, but the coral itself and the zooxanthellae inside the coral really don't use UV or violet.

 

[Nanolifeuk]

Your light schedule doesn't look particularly strong. I have the same light on a smaller, shallower 15 gal (soft/LPS) tank, running higher settings with no problems.

What did you increase your light to ? I know montipora SPS can take 200-450 PAR so unless it was crazy high it may not of been this? No parameter fluxuations that you noticed?

Im reluctant to keep any more SPS because of how sensitive they are to kh fluctuations etc.

 

[Nanolifeuk]

On further looking maybe lower your whites? I use a very long ramp up and down for white, they only really max out at 30, also your whites increase in afternoon , they may benefit more with lower white and more blue as the evening goes on. It could of been from this

I read a really good article the other day explaining Daily Light Intergral, which is basically the accumulation of PAR throughout the day.
It basically explained that we focus on PAR like the mm amount of rain falling on a certain area at one moment. We should be more concerned on the daily mm of rain to fall on that area.

This means if you prefer stronger lights for viewing purposes or whatever, this is fine given you reduce the amount of daily light (or strength in other parts of the day).
Similarly if you wanted to extend the amount of hours of viewing (e.g watching tank on a late Saturday night ) this is okay given you reduce the output of them.

 

[iheartgobies]

Turn down the UV and violet. A very small amount of that spectrum goes a long way to make fluorescing corals look cool, but the coral itself and the zooxanthellae inside the coral really don't use UV or violet.

I didn’t know this. Thank you so much!!

 

[iheartgobies]

Your light schedule doesn't look particularly strong. I have the same light on a smaller, shallower 15 gal (soft/LPS) tank, running higher settings with no problems.

What did you increase your light to ? I know montipora SPS can take 200-450 PAR so unless it was crazy high it may not of been this? No parameter fluxuations that you noticed?

Im reluctant to keep any more SPS because of how sensitive they are to kh fluctuations etc.

I didn’t notice any parameter fluctuations but my montipora has always been more on the pale side. I guess turning the light up pushed it over the edge. I believe it was sitting at around 55-60 for all the blues and purples and I bumped it up to 65 when I got the birdsnest (I heard they like more light) After my plate bleached I turned it down to 50. Maybe it’s not my light and ill have to dig deeper (any ideas?) but I’d like a better lighting schedule anyways, it might benefit all my corals! By the way your preset looks good, would I be able to download it and try it out? Thanks for the response btw!

 

[iheartgobies]

On further looking maybe lower your whites? I use a very long ramp up and down for white, they only really max out at 30, also your whites increase in afternoon , they may benefit more with lower white and more blue as the evening goes on. It could of been from this

I read a really good article the other day explaining Daily Light Intergral, which is basically the accumulation of PAR throughout the day.
It basically explained that we focus on PAR like the mm amount of rain falling on a certain area at one moment. We should be more concerned on the daily mm of rain to fall on that area.

This means if you prefer stronger lights for viewing purposes or whatever, this is fine given you reduce the amount of daily light (or strength in other parts of the day).
Similarly if you wanted to extend the amount of hours of viewing (e.g watching tank on a late Saturday night ) this is okay given you reduce the output of them.

I run white throughout the day because it’s easier on my eyes and it’s right in my bedroom. I’ll definitely lower it and see if that helps! Thanks for the information it’s greatly appreciated

 

[aSaltyKlown]

Did you use the acclimation setting when you did turn the lights up? If not, that could be a reason for the bleaching. Definitely on the low side, as Nanoleifeuk mentioned. I also run a version of the Saxby setting on my 13.5g EVO.

Check out the BRSTV video on the AI Prime - some great info there.

 

[Nanolifeuk]

(any ideas?)

Sorry man none that I can think of. I struggled with my AI for a while and spent ages researching spectrums etc and I really liked the look of the David Saxby Schedule. It was still a bit bright for the tank size & corals I am keeping so I reduced it about 70%.

Im struggling to attach my settings into the forum but if you want to E-mail me I can try through there. Alternatively, The original Saxby setting is downloadable on the AI website which may be a bit stronger and suited for your tank.

Your tank looks really good otherwise and sps are delicate things so it may just be something as simple as a little tweak in the light spectrum.

 

[iheartgobies]

Did you use the acclimation setting when you did turn the lights up? If not, that could be a reason for the bleaching. Definitely on the low side, as Nanoleifeuk mentioned. I also run a version of the Saxby setting on my 13.5g EVO.

Check out the BRSTV video on the AI Prime - some great info there.

I didn’t even know the acclimation setting was a thing … I thought if I turned it up a little at a time it would be okay. I’ll have to figure out how to use it and try to slowly change my preset to the saxby one, I wanna give it a try. Thank you for the vid recommendation, I’ll go watch it now!

 

[iheartgobies]

Sorry man none that I can think of. I struggled with my AI for a while and spent ages researching spectrums etc and I really liked the look of the David Saxby Schedule. It was still a bit bright for the tank size & corals I am keeping so I reduced it about 70%.

Im struggling to attach my settings into the forum but if you want to E-mail me I can try through there. Alternatively, The original Saxby setting is downloadable on the AI website which may be a bit stronger and suited for your tank.

Your tank looks really good otherwise and sps are delicate things so it may just be something as simple as a little tweak in the light spectrum.

Yeah honestly the AI app is kind of a pain, it took me like an hour to figure out how to create my own custom preset to begin with Also thank you!! I have the saxby preset downloaded so I’m gonna acclimate it and probably tweak it a little. Thanks for the help once again