Enough flow / light? (and photos of newbie's tank)

[aurora.k]

Hello!

Here is a photo of my new tank! I posted my "Hi, I'm new!" post, but didn't include photos or these questions. Importantly, I mostly want to have cool corals (just a couple fish / CUC to compliment my corals) so lights and water and everything should be set up for coral. So far I just have easy/medium corals.

The tank is 14 gallons, but as you can see is tall (sorry, photo is at a weird angle to avoid glare) and it doesn't look that yellow in real life.

Water Question: Enough Flow? I have a Coralife Marine Filter with Protein Skimmer for up to 30 gallons - Skimmer works great ( I mean, it skims stuff that looks like sea foam, especially when tank was cycling - I can't say it works great relative to other skimmers), and flow seems strong, but not sure it's strong enough. That said, at first I put the mushroom coral right at the top and they seemed to not like it so I moved them down half way and they are happy. And my bubble coral at the bottom looks super happy, always open during the day and its tentacles come out at night - but it is only a week with me so low flow might not be bothering it yet.


Light Questions: So, I learned right away that I don't have enough light, even though I had previously had my husband install an extra full spectrum light to the hood - doubling the original amount of light. I just got a WattShine 140W that I haven't installed yet - I went high on watts because the tank is deep so I thought the normal W / gallons might not be enough for me.

(1) that's enough light for my tank once I set it up, right?
(2) when I install it / make my husband install it, should I just start on it dimmed low and then slowly raise it to not burn the corals since right now my light is not that bright?

Thanks in advance!!

Aurora

 

[Vahanyos]

Definitely start slow on light and increase a little every other day or so and just monitor your coral. You seem to have the right mindset already. As far as flow, as long as your coral are opening up and not getting blown away or disturbed by the flow, or your sand is not getting tossed up, you’re good. That’s how I always determine flow,.. I think the most flow you can have without creating a sandstorm or irritating your coral the better. It’s when you don’t have enough is when the issues occur. Just my experience

 

[Vahanyos]

You can condition your coral to get used to high light, just don’t shock them with sudden change in intensity