Coral metabolism vs. light par

[danny zubot]

So then, how do I get the most out of my corals? For example, I have a Tri-color Nana that is mostly tan with very brown polyps, and has some purple in the tips. How would I get this coral to color up more? I usually feed the tank Reef Roids once a week in addition to the frozen brine shrimp the fish get every other day. Over all though, I would way my tank is on the lower side of nutrients because of my over sized skimmer, reactor and fuge. Should I raise up my light to decrease the zooanthallea population in the coral? Or feed the corals less to do the same thing? I addition to the main three additives, I also dose regularily these suppliments.

-Iodine
-Strontium/molebdenum
-Iron/manganese
-pottasium iodide
-amino acids (Reef plus)

[StirCrazy]

color is very tricky.. there is real color which you get under very intense lighting and low nutrients and there is fake color, which you get by mixing different color t5's

what I am getting at is if you take a color with true color out of the tank away from blue lights the coral is not brownish... it is the color you see in the tank. an example was my old tri colored blue milli.. it was purple, blue and light blue.. when I moved and we were unpacking it it looked the same in the air as it did under 10K lights.

Fake color (which you can get under any lighting just couldn't resist the dig at t5's ) is when you have a coral that is a beautiful blue and then you pull it out and it is brownish with maybe a hint of blue.. fake colors are a reflectance color where the coral adsorbs light and reflects it out as a different or similar color. different types of coral will flores with different colors depending on the pigmentation they have developed and a few other factors. so you could shine a 14K bulb on 6 corals that look brown in the sunlight but one might floress green another few blue, one red ect... most T5 set up are using combos of different bulbs to maximize this effect which I call fake color. also anyone who uses heavy blue MH lights is using this also.

the tanks look nice but I personally like a tank of true color and accordingly use a 10K light with just a hint of actinic to give me a icy white look instead of blue.. but to be successful with this type of tank you need to find nicer specimen corals and be very picky with water quality/lighting/water flow ect..



Steve

[Canadian]

Originally Posted by StirCrazy

color is very tricky.. there is real color which you get under very intense lighting and low nutrients and there is fake color, which you get by mixing different color t5's

what I am getting at is if you take a color with true color out of the tank away from blue lights the coral is not brownish... it is the color you see in the tank. an example was my old tri colored blue milli.. it was purple, blue and light blue.. when I moved and we were unpacking it it looked the same in the air as it did under 10K lights.

Fake color (which you can get under any lighting just couldn't resist the dig at t5's ) is when you have a coral that is a beautiful blue and then you pull it out and it is brownish with maybe a hint of blue.. fake colors are a reflectance color where the coral adsorbs light and reflects it out as a different or similar color. different types of coral will flores with different colors depending on the pigmentation they have developed and a few other factors. so you could shine a 14K bulb on 6 corals that look brown in the sunlight but one might floress green another few blue, one red ect... most T5 set up are using combos of different bulbs to maximize this effect which I call fake color. also anyone who uses heavy blue MH lights is using this also.

the tanks look nice but I personally like a tank of true color and accordingly use a 10K light with just a hint of actinic to give me a icy white look instead of blue.. but to be successful with this type of tank you need to find nicer specimen corals and be very picky with water quality/lighting/water flow ect..



Steve

Steve, I know you're partially jesting with the comments on T5s but thought I would post a link to some pics of corals grown under T5s but photographed (at the end of the document) out of the water and no longer under T5s to show that the color is "true" to some extent especially as it relates to purple pigments:

http://archiv.korallenriff.de/Lichttest/T5-1.pdf

[fishytime]

Originally Posted by StirCrazy

nope.. kinda nothing to do with light.. Temp will however speed up or slow down the rate. All more light is going to do is make more food available from the algae... if the coral is already getting enought food more light will reduce the amout of algae in the coral making it more colorfull to a point.

.

Steve

I have to disagree with this statement...the availability of light has everything to do with the health of a coral (as do water parameters and flow)... all sps do not have the same lighting requirements and need to be placed accordingly.

Danny, have you seen the recent pics of that nana piece I got from you a while back? I assume the one you are talking about is the same colony?

My guess would be something else with your water parameters...not saying there is anything "wrong" with your water...perhaps just lacking in something

[StirCrazy]

Originally Posted by fishytime

I have to disagree with this statement...the availability of light has everything to do with the health of a coral (as do water parameters and flow)... all sps do not have the same lighting requirements and need to be placed accordingly.

the question wasn't about the helth, it was does light affect the metabalism of the coral. and from everything I have read on corals the only thing that directly affects the metabalism of a coral is temp. but having said that if you can find something that states other things let me know as I am always interestd on reading stuff like that on corals.

Steve

[StirCrazy]

Originally Posted by Canadian

Steve, I know you're partially jesting with the comments on T5s but thought I would post a link to some pics of corals grown under T5s but photographed (at the end of the document) out of the water and no longer under T5s to show that the color is "true" to some extent especially as it relates to purple pigments:

http://archiv.korallenriff.de/Lichttest/T5-1.pdf

yes I was jesting a lot.. I did forget to mention you can get true color out of any lighting also but it is not as common under lower intensity lights like VHO, PC, T5, ect.. this is where the being extremely picky and selective with your corals comes in.

I do have one problem with that link you posted.. it is a fauna marine add. they didn't show out of tank photos before the test only after, so we have no idea on the quality of the corals before the test so I can not look at that pdf and consider the whole thing valid. plus if thee is one thing I have learned in the last 8 years is to take any advertisment with a grain of salt.. do they want to sell there products... you bet so if they can make there product look a bit better will they... you bet.. now I have nothing against Fauna marine personaly (thought I better make that clear) I am going to be buying there proflux, and I wish they would staert putting out some nice colored MH bulbs.. like maybe a true 12000K color temp 250 watt SE

Steve

[Canadian]

Steve,

Fauna Marin isn't equivalent to GHL Profilux - they just happen to be distributed by the same North American distributor (Aqua Digital). So you can criticize Fauna all you want without criticizing GHL.

And I agree about the pics being an add but they were the only ones I knew of off the top of my head that included underwater and out of water pictures of SPS grown under T5s.

[StirCrazy]

Originally Posted by Canadian

Steve,

Fauna Marin isn't equivalent to GHL Profilux - they just happen to be distributed by the same North American distributor (Aqua Digital). So you can criticize Fauna all you want without criticizing GHL.

And I agree about the pics being an add but they were the only ones I knew of off the top of my head that included underwater and out of water pictures of SPS grown under T5s.

ah good to know I thought they were one and the same. but I am not critisizing, just stating that I cannot accept a company's add as proof. thats why we have places like consumers reports and such

Steve

[Myka]

Originally Posted by danny zubot

I addition to the main three additives, I also dose regularily these suppliments.

-Iodine
-Strontium/molebdenum
-Iron/manganese
-pottasium iodide
-amino acids (Reef plus)

You realize that Potassium iodide is iodine? Are you dosing iodine twice then? Are you testing for iodine, iron, and strontium? If not, how do you decide how much to dose? FWIW, there does not exist a hobby grade test kit that is particularly accurate for either iodine or iron.

Why don't you try out a few of the ZEO products? I have noticed a huge difference in my corals, and I think it would be mainly attributed to ZEOvit Pohl's Coral Vitalizer.

What's your temp at? I've always found my corals are more colorful if I keep the temp below 80. Tough in the summer though...

[sharuq1]

I'm having the same problem with some of my corals, tagging along