Whats better Actinic or Super White Bulbs

[Tank2379]

I do not know what is better to have More Blue Bulbs than White or a little Mixture? I been on a few forums and a lot of other folks are favoring More Blue for Coral Growth. But then some have a Mixture of Bulb and Daylight Bulbs that also work? I guess I wanna know what do you guys think is better to have and promotes coral growth more Blue Bulbs or Have a Mixture of Blue and White?

 

[pat8you]

White bulbs (in the range of 10-12000k or so) have a higher PPFD then the higher kelvin bulbs (which are the blue ones). I think if i'm remembering right stands for photosynthetic photon flux density. This is just a measure of the amount of light that will reach your corals in a spectrum of light that corals can use for energy.

Some people theorize that corals use blue light better because the other colors in light filter out first by the water as you go down in depth. Most of the corals we keep in our reefs are collected for relatively shallow depths where the filtering of other colors in the spectrum is relatively neglect able.

In the end i believe most lighting experts believe that corals adapt to different kinds of light so well that it would be impossible to have a "perfect" or "correct" kind of light in our aquariums without having a habitat specific tank of corals all collected from the same depths and lighting conditions.

There is probably something to be said for having a more complete balance of color in the lighting spectrum. Which would include the more blue ends of the spectrum as well. I would suggest 50/50 as the highest ratio of blue to the more white bulbs. Blue spectrum light seems to help make the colors of corals "pop" a bit. Pick a combination of bulbs that you find pleasing.

CCCapt has a multitude of articles that i am drawing most of this information from but unfortunately my computer has a virus and i don't have the links for you at this time. Sanjay (not sure on the spelling) has done a lot of work on testing different bulbs available and usually does a good job explaining how light effects the different kinds of light effect our corals.

I personally like a bit of a blue tint to my light. Hope that helps.

Pat

 

[Tank2379]

Sweet. Well if you can find those link I would Greatly Appreciate it... In most case I am thinking of having more Blue than Day Bulbs, but just knowing which bulbs work the best. I wish I knew. Now my signature I have the Nova extreme pro which come stock with 3 daylight 10K and 3 Blue 460NM... Now just a quick question on these type of Bulb with the Blue 420NM and 460NM which bulb is the best to use our of the 2? Cause I really want to put 4 blue in my system and Keep one 10K and a 12K 50/50 Bulb. was wondering if that can be accomplished?....

 

[Kurt_Nelson]

I think it just gets down to personal preference. If I remember correctly, there's definitely certain types of bulbs to use if you're strictly looking for coral growth and not the aesthetics of how it looks. That would really apply more to coral farmers. But for most of us that are just looking for "pretty" corals that grow decent, I believe a mix of actinic (any of the 4xx nm) and white (10k, 14k, etc) will work just fine. I just gets down to how blue you want your stuff to look. More actinics will obviously add more blue. Play with taking individual bulbs out of your fixture to see how the different ratios of white to blue look.

Personally, I've always like the look of 50% actinic lighting and 50% 10k lighting. It gives you that "daylight" look, but has enough actinic to really make those fluorescent greens "pop". But again... it's just a personal preference.

Regarding the 420 vs the 460... the 420 will be a deeper blue than the 460. But I'm not you'd really see the difference.

 

[Tank2379]

Well I just want more growth out of my Corals. The corals I have now are growing really well. Just thought a little boost of Blue will help them grown just a tad bit faster but not to fast.

 

[melosu58]

I like to suggest a mixture. I personally think they do better in actinic lighting but all actinic lighting is not pleasant to the eye. That`s why I have two super actinic bulbs and two 50/50 bulbs. That gives me plenty of actinic lighting and plenty of white lighting. Very pleasant to the eye. Kurt hit it on the head when he said it`s personal preference.

 

[Tank2379]

I will take all of suggestion into consideration for future Bulb Selections. .. Thanks guys..