Can I use a led light that grows plants for my reef tank?!

[MaxTremors]

Actually at 10 meters down on a sunny day theres a ton of white light. Sandbed looks white not blue, coral grow in this light. Hell on the great barrier reef there's sps poking out the surface in places. The blue light look is not how the reefs look in the wild.

No, as I said, the majority of the light at 10’ is blue (but in context I was mostly referring to the red/yellow light the OP was asking about). And reefs absolutely look blue when you go diving/snorkeling. When you see photos of reefs that don’t look washed out and blue, it’s because they’re using a flash or artificial lighting, but I can assure you, if you go diving everything looks washed out and blue.

I agree with you that the super blue look that a lot of people have on their tanks doesn’t look natural, it’s a simulation/exaggeration of the kind of light that corals would be getting at 5-50 meters of depth only in 1’-3’ of depth. And as I said, some corals from shallower water do better under whiter light, but baring some acropora species, a few other SPS species, and a few soft coral species, the majority of the corals we keep come from 10-30 meter depths, and they have evolved to utilize light in the blue spectrum (400-550nm).

 

[hart24601]

I can’t say if it will work or not, but I have a 150g Rubbermaid stock tank for a basement sump and put a kessil h380 grow light on it at 1st for chaeto, but eventually put clams, mushrooms, couple acro, and some lps under it and they grew and did fantastic. Even had to give some of the clams to the local zoo as they got too large and gave extra mushrooms to my local reefers. So my experience is at least with h380 it works fine but that light still has lots of blue even if overpowered by red.

 

[Harold999]

But hey I tend to run my tanks white and run 6500k bulbs sometimes. Idk why people think it has to look blue... thats a bunch of hooey.

Efficiency. Putting watts (= money) into the red spectrum is pointless for coral grow, they don't need it.
With a 6500k bulb your corals receive about an equal amount of red, green and blue, but you could leave out the red and green and still get the same amount of growth.

 

[Tamberav]

Efficiency. Putting watts (= money) into the red spectrum is pointless for coral grow, they don't need it.
With a 6500k bulb your corals receive about an equal amount of red, green and blue, but you could leave out the red and green and still get the same amount of growth.

6500k is/was really popular for coral propagation in terms of growth and color. Perhaps for lots of par. Bulbs are cheap too. Then that whole non chlorophyll light reactors/pigments crap that respond to yellow/green that some corals have.

Efficiency doesn’t really matter for the OP. He wants to use what he has.

A red tank won’t look to nice but he should certainly be able to cover up a bunch of reds and grow lower par stuff. I say lower par since half of his leds wont be something he is using.

 

[Shooter6]

No, as I said, the majority of the light at 10’ is blue (but in context I was mostly referring to the red/yellow light the OP was asking about). And reefs absolutely look blue when you go diving/snorkeling. When you see photos of reefs that don’t look washed out and blue, it’s because they’re using a flash or artificial lighting, but I can assure you, if you go diving everything looks washed out and blue.

I agree with you that the super blue look that a lot of people have on their tanks doesn’t look natural, it’s a simulation/exaggeration of the kind of light that corals would be getting at 5-50 meters of depth only in 1’-3’ of depth. And as I said, some corals from shallower water do better under whiter light, but baring some acropora species, a few other SPS species, and a few soft coral species, the majority of the corals we keep come from 10-30 meter depths, and they have evolved to utilize light in the blue spectrum (400-550nm).

I've been a military diver since 91' keeping reefs since 88' and I will assure you the only blue you see at 10 feet, (3 meters) is blue coral,sponge , or the water if your looking far away. White sunlight most definitely reaches past 10 meters.
At 3 meters the reefs look closest to 65k at 30 meters 10k-15k. The heavy blue is not natural, instead it's used to increase and highlight the fluorescence in some coral, and to cause the coral colors to pop more.
Anyone who has been around reefing longer then leds will tell you 65k to 14k metal halides will cause coral to grow almost while your watching your reef.
I do agree that red is filtered out much sooner, but white most definitely is not.

 

[Lasse]

Use your light - just take down the red a little during adaption period. In this picture you can see a tank below grow lights from Heliospectra . you can see how the light is mirrored in surface - a lot of red

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The picture is from this video and in the second part of the video - you can see how it looks in the whole tank. This had been run for more than 2 years now!!



However - the photosynthesis from red light is huge - there is a risk for forming of oxygen radicals in the interface between coral and water - high flow will help to transport away these.

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Harold999]

I do agree that red is filtered out much sooner, but white most definitely is not.

Filtering out red causes the white looking more blue/bluegreen.
Pure white = red + green + blue in equal amounts.

 

[Shooter6]

Filtering out red causes the white looking more blue/bluegreen.
Pure white = red + green + blue in equal amounts.

White has all the colors of the spectrum filtering out red does not remove the yellow orange, ect......

 

[Shooter6]

Here is what a reef looks 10 feet down

 

[Shooter6]

 

[Shooter6]

 

[Shooter6]

 

[frizzayyyyreef]

Thanks everyone for the input ! I’ll keep everyone posted I’m going to try and cover the red bulbs I think after reading everyone can agree to that , I just hope it looks nice but I’m gonna miss that blue color it makes the corals pop....I’ll let everyone know I’m not sure the wattage of the light is I got it years ago thanks again y’all ! Any tips on how to move a 75 gallon tank without paying 1000 bucks ?!

 

[Shooter6]

Thanks everyone for the input ! I’ll keep everyone posted I’m going to try and cover the red bulbs I think after reading everyone can agree to that , I just hope it looks nice but I’m gonna miss that blue color it makes the corals pop....I’ll let everyone know I’m not sure the wattage of the light is I got it years ago thanks again y’all ! Any tips on how to move a 75 gallon tank without paying 1000 bucks ?!

Many buckets, and friends. As far as long term please don't try to keep using just that light. Consider it a temporary holdover. Theres plenty of cheap options on ebay to get the proper lighting. A 4bulb 4ft odyssea t5 fixture is around 130.00 with 2 white and 2 blue bulbs. Then there's the popbloom blackboxes, or even the chinese reefbars in heavy blue and daylight. A combo of 3-4 of those on a couple wall timers should give you the ability to grow any coral.

 

[Harold999]

White has all the colors of the spectrum filtering out red does not remove the yellow orange, ect......

Filtering out red removes orange because orange is a part of the red spectrum.
There are 3 main colors, red green and blue. All other colors are part of those 3.

Red + green + blue in equal amounts = pure white 6500K.

 

[Lasse]

Pure white according to photons - all wavelengths in the visible spectrum. Pure white for our eyes Red + green + blue in equal amounts. The quality of light from the sun at 6500 K is higher than the quality of RGB in 6500 K

Sincerely Lasse

 

[authentic]

What about using a prime fuge light to grow tomatoes? I just set up seedlings under my frag tank,using my apex to run the light 16 hrs a day,figured if it can grow algae it can grow tomatoes

 

[Lasse]

What about using a prime fuge light to grow tomatoes? I just set up seedlings under my frag tank,using my apex to run the light 16 hrs a day,figured if it can grow algae it can grow tomatoes

Good idea

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Shooter6]

Filtering out red removes orange because orange is a part of the red spectrum.
There are 3 main colors, red green and blue. All other colors are part of those 3.

Red + green + blue in equal amounts = pure white 6500K.

Orange is a different wavelength then straight red, therefore penetrates deeper. Just like red penetrated deeper then infrared. Sorry if this isn't understood by you but it is a fact. Just like the full spectrum of the light penetrates far deeper then 10ft. It's at about 30ft, 10 meters that the reds and orange start to be noticeably absent. White light is still there though. 40ft is where the whites are far less and the blue light is much more noticeable.

Most of our reef inhabitants that are photosynthetic can and do live in the 30meter zone.....

 

[Harold999]

Orange is a different wavelength then straight red, therefore penetrates deeper. Just like red penetrated deeper then infrared. Sorry if this isn't understood by you but it is a fact. Just like the full spectrum of the light penetrates far deeper then 10ft. It's at about 30ft, 10 meters that the reds and orange start to be noticeably absent. White light is still there though. 40ft is where the whites are far less and the blue light is much more noticeable.

Most of our reef inhabitants that are photosynthetic can and do live in the 30meter zone.....

White light, oranges (amber), and pink/purple (magenta) doesn't exist without red. Looks like you don't understand that red (and green + blue) are the primary colors which all other visible wavelengths are made from.