Dragon's Breath Lighting

trophyhimbo

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Hello! Will the Innovative Marine ChaetoMax™ 2-IN-1 Refugium LED Light [9 Watt] be sufficient to grow Dragon's Breath in an AIO chamber refugium or is this for Chaeto only? Idea is to use Dragon's Breath as both an ornamental macro algae in the display and in the refugium to help culture copepods.

If not, are there any other lighting recommendations? This Tunze LED white eco chic could also fit with my setup, but I am open to all suggestions! I thought I read somewhere that Dragon's Breath prefers a more broad spectrum light, is this true?
 

geeked

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Hello! Will the Innovative Marine ChaetoMax™ 2-IN-1 Refugium LED Light [9 Watt] be sufficient to grow Dragon's Breath in an AIO chamber refugium or is this for Chaeto only? Idea is to use Dragon's Breath as both an ornamental macro algae in the display and in the refugium to help culture copepods.

If not, are there any other lighting recommendations? This Tunze LED white eco chic could also fit with my setup, but I am open to all suggestions! I thought I read somewhere that Dragon's Breath prefers a more broad spectrum light, is this true?
I have looked on R2R for a few weeks for the answer to this question. The only logical answer I have found was that since Dragon breath is red, it reflects red light so the red light doesn't help it grow and it grows better under full spectrum where it can absorb the white light. I bought a radion FW (it was half off somewhere otherwise not worth the price) in hopes to grow it and some mangroves in my refugium.
 

Ichtha_yo Stuff

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Dragons breath is not a fast growing macroalgae, so why would you want to use it in a refugium? If you are using dragons breath in your display as an ordimental, that would make sense because it looks nice. If your goal is to culture pods in a refugium him in the back compartment of an AIO throw some rubble and use it as a dark cube with no light, that’s what I am doing and have a large pod population. Dragons Breath looks best under a blue light because it flourence. It will grow under white light too. Never tried growing it under red light.
 
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trophyhimbo

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Ended up throwing a small handful into my display a couple weeks ago and after the initial shipping stress, it seems to be exhibiting new growth and a ton of new fluorescent tips to replace the ends that first melted off. This is under a lot of blues and some whites (Saxby preset on AI Hydra 32s). Hoping these are good signs!

Dragons breath is not a fast growing macroalgae, so why would you want to use it in a refugium? If you are using dragons breath in your display as an ordimental, that would make sense because it looks nice. If your goal is to culture pods in a refugium him in the back compartment of an AIO throw some rubble and use it as a dark cube with no light, that’s what I am doing and have a large pod population. Dragons Breath looks best under a blue light because it flourence. It will grow under white light too. Never tried growing it under red light.
This is a great idea thanks! Got some leftover rock to smash too

I grow a lot of dragon breath in my sump, I use a $40 coral light bulb from amazon (mainly blue+white), and it works very well. They also grow under chaetomax in my other tank, but way slower.
Good to know, thank you! Will be sticking with the macroalgae in my display for now until something starts chewing on it haha
 

Subsea

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In the LED world, white light is composed of red/green/blue. In my experience, Bortacladia looks best under 10K color rendition.
 

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