Wattage Calculation

[aravindk]

I am using a Coralife 48" PC with two 65W 10,000K white bulbs and two 65W acitinic blue bulbs. When you calculate wattage per gallon do you include the wattage from blue lights also? I have a 72g bowfront and wondering what kind of corals my lighting can handle. I am particularly inteterested in keeping an anemone.

[ohio reefer]

i think general rule of thumb is 3-2 watts per gal. i would assume you count the blues also. depending how deep your aquarium is will depend on what you can stock. i don't think it would be good idea to stock clams though.

hth

mark

[morgan24]

you have almost 4 wts per gal so i would think u would be able to do an anemone. How old is your tank. I have a bubble anemone and a condy under 3.2 wts per gal and they are fine.

[aravindk]

Two point five weeks :-(. I know I should not hurry.

[morgan24]

yeah i would wait at least 6 months and if your water is stable then i would try one

[aravindk]

Are these acitinic lights (blue lights 2X65W) are also called as moon lights? Thats what my lfs said.

Anyway if I have these acitinic lights, do I need a lunar (LED) lights also? If I need, then can you suggest some good ones? I wonder if there is a model that I can install inside my existing 48" pc.

What is the recommended schedule for the lights? 12 hours of actinic and 10 hours of white light is something I saw in another post. Is this a good schedule?

Also the tank is my living room, where there is bright window light available most of the daytime. I sometimes like the tank without the lights. The available light from the Window gives my tank a new perspective. When I have my corals in the tank, is it okay to leave the lights off for few hours a day when there is adequate light in the room?

[ryguy]

No those aren't moon lights. They are used to bring some of the flouresence out of some corals and enhance your fishes colours. People then in turn use them to simulate a dusk and dawn effect. Coralife has 3/4W LED moon lights available, about $20 or so. I bought the same moon light last night and it looks supercool i think. It clips into the track of the light strip you have, either in the front or back. It gives a really cool shimmering effect at night.

you could buy a couple if you want to illuminate your whole tank at night....(not too bright but enough to see some activity) or just buy one, my thought was it would look more natural to have one shinning down into one area, the highest peak of rock work.

Ryan