What are some low light corals?

[Strickland_673]

I'm looking to see if there's a list out there of corals and their light needs. i have a 2X24W T5HO fixture on a 15" deep tank and wondering what i can successfully keep alive!

[Fishward]

how many gallons is your tank? 2 bulbs is not alot. what are the other dimesions of your tank?

[Strickland_673]

25g it's 31X11.5X15. i'm planning on getting another 2 bulb fixture shortly and then upgrading to LED within the year.

[jorjef]

My tank is more than 15" deep with the same lights. I consider myself a bit lucky on keeping some of these corals, alot has to do to how high up I have them.

Blastos, pipe coral, mushrooms, toadstool, torch coral, frogspawn, tongue coral, feather dusters, duncans, GTBA, bubble coral, coco worm, cats eye coral, sun corals, button pylops, cabbage coral,

[lorenz0]

IMO, anything but sps. seriously. I have had great sucess with them all in a low light pc tank. personally if I were you i would be looking at zoa's, hammer, frogspawn, torch, duncans, suncoral, dendro's, mushrooms, acans, open brains. Even if you add another 2 bulbs this would be great.

Alot of people always tell people about strong fixtures, and this can be to much for alot of corals. Imo 4 t5's to me is a medium lite tank. And for what you have, you can do alot of cool stuff with it.

[bvlester]

most softies and LPS will work not all and some SPS will live but not many they would have to be from deep waters, as they are use to not getting much light. So I would say maybe some of the Monti cup corals greens don't require as much light and red should be ok as long as you put them up high. I had Monti's under T5's they did well for me.

Bill

[Ron99]

I really like cyphastreas too. My meteor shower cyphastrea is one of my favourites. To bad you are on the east coast, I have a frag or two available.

[Strickland_673]

thanks a lot!!!

Thanks anyway Ron! oh the joy of living on the east coast!!!

[daniella3d]

Zoanthids, palythoas, ricordeas and mushroom will be doing well. Anytyhing that is eating will also do well, like frogspawn, hammer coral, duncan and candy cane.

Pretty much everything except sps. If you had 3 x 24w T5HO you could probably keep sps as well.

Oh..I forgot...Aussie Acan!!!! Those things bleach so easily if the light is strong so they need very low light. Their colors are awesome but they do need feeding here and there since they need so little light.

I'm looking to see if there's a list out there of corals and their light needs. i have a 2X24W T5HO fixture on a 15" deep tank and wondering what i can successfully keep alive!

[Strickland_673]

In have a hagen GLO 2X24W,

and I have

Giesemann:
1 X AquaBlue + = 60% Actinic 40% combination (15000K)

2 X Actinic + = peaks at 450nm (22000K)

but i only have room for 2 bulbs, should i do one of each or 2 actinic +, tank is 15" deep and i would like corals at some point. i know i wont be able to have all corals, but thats down the road.

Thanks Again

[Myka]

I posted this in your other thread, but for anyone else reading this thread I will copy and paste:

If you have optimum flow and pristine water conditions you can easily get away with less than optimal lighting and still have great looking corals. If you keep that in mind, and you also keep in mind to use higher PAR bulbs you will be able to keep some SPS corals with your light setup.

To get the most out of your light fixture though, know that 10,000K white bulbs (in general) have highest PAR, then 20,000K blue, blue plus (blue plus actinic), then actinic. Brand of bulb also makes a big difference. After running Giesemann bulbs years ago, I have switched brands many times, and am no longer a fan of Giesemann T5s. There are better bulbs out there for the same cost.

If you're really into the actinic look consider either a UVL Super Actinic which has low PAR, but unusually high PUR in comparison or a UVL 454 which is my new favourite "blue plus". ATI makes a nice blue plus with one of the highest PAR values, but they are pricey.

Korallen Zucht Coral Light 10,000K would be my favourite white bulb, and the KZ Coral Light II 14,000K would be my favourite bulb to use for a semi-white bulb. The KZ bulbs are also pricey.

I am not a fan of the AquaScience bulbs; although they are quite popular I find they don't hold their color very long at all. I have a 3 month old AS 22,000K that has faded to be whiter than a Hagen 18,000K bulb with almost 18 months on it! The AS started out much bluer than the Hagen.

So long story short, of the bulbs you listed I would suggest you use one of each, but when the time comes to replace bulbs in 8 months you may want to consider switching to different brands and spectrum.

FYI, I have the same fixture over a Zoa tank where the bulbs are about 17" from the sand (15" of water), and I can grow all the SPS I want in there provided they are placed high up in the tank. I use this tank as a QT for SPS since newly acquired SPS won't infect Zoas with any disease or parasite they may be carrying. I keep the SPS on a rack at the water surface placed as high as possible without the corals coming out of the water. Some of these are very high light Acroporas, and they do quite well in this tank considering it is far from ideal for them.