How to guarantee sps success.

[peterhos]

HI All

As I struggled to understand PAR PUR and the rest it suddenly dawned (pardon the pun) on me. Simply buy 6 small frags of one species. Place them around the tank and see which thrive in which spot. Hey presto! Now we now what that sps needs. Buy 6 more and repeat.

Has nobody ever advocated this before? Or shot the idea down in flames?

 

[Waters]

Well, if you are confident that the only thing your new SPS are missing is the proper lighting, then yes, I guess it would work. Unfortunately that is just one small piece to their requirements though. Other issue is one species requires different PAR than another so unless you plan on filling the whole tank with one type of SPS, not sure if it would help anyways?

 

[Glenner’sreef]

Definitely cheaper than purchasing 6 different lights mounted across your tank!

 

[peterhos]

Well, if you are confident that the only thing your new SPS are missing is the proper lighting, then yes, I guess it would work. Unfortunately that is just one small piece to their requirements though. Other issue is one species requires different PAR than another so unless you plan on filling the whole tank with one type of SPS, not sure if it would help anyways?

Of course I take your point, but my suggestion dies not mean that I am only thinking of lighting, just thinking that in any tank buying multiple examples if any sps would let the sps tell us where it thrives in our tank. And no, once we find a good position for one coral type then we test out a few more. Assuming a tank has good parameters we let the coral us where to position it. One consideration is cost of course.

 

[Lineatus]

Of course I take your point, but my suggestion dies not mean that I am only thinking of lighting, just thinking that in any tank buying multiple examples if any sps would let the sps tell us where it thrives in our tank. And no, once we find a good position for one coral type then we test out a few more. Assuming a tank has good parameters we let the coral us where to position it. One consideration is cost of course.

I love the idea but in reality a sample size of six is very small. Too many other variables could be the real reason for the frags success

 

[livinlifeinBKK]

I agree that there are many variables at play and buying 6 of each coral you wanted would be a rather expensive way of determining good placement, wouldn't it?

 

[peterhos]

Have just looked at some coral prices in the US so yes!. My idea only works with a few much cheaper frags.. in general terms though buy a coral put it in the tank and move it around for a few weeks to find the ideal spot. But then ……

 

[billyocean]

You can use a par meter and map out your lights in the tank. I've found 200-250 to be sufficient in growing most sps with varying degrees of growth. Most of mine are in 280-400ish. Vendors are going to have their acros in 250ish+ when they grow them out. If you known your par then that is one less variable. Although we can also bend the variables of white par vs blue par as well and the effects of hebmajority of one over the other..lol. At least you will have an idea if you know #s. Then we get to flow...then relative stability of alk, calc, mag, n03/p04. What alk are you going to run relative to your nutrients? Quite a few factors to consider that light alone won't help no matter the par. Perfect light+bad flow=possibly dead...perfect light+bottomed out n03/po4..possibly dead..etc

 

[Tamberav]

Seems simpler and more cost effective just to change to T5 or MH if you don’t want to mess with par and led settings.

 

[peterhos]

Seems simpler and more cost effective just to change to T5 or MH if you don’t want to mess with par and led settings.

I had T5 for a few years 20 years back. Eight new bulbs a year cost a packet though the blue actinic were good. Not many UK hobbyists using MH as our energy costs have increased by leaps and bounds.

 

[Tamberav]

I had T5 for a few years 20 years back. Eight new bulbs a year cost a packet though the blue actinic were good. Not many UK hobbyists using MH as our energy costs have increased by leaps and bounds.

Well the bulb cost.. but considering the cost of name brand fixtures and the amount to get proper spread on a densely packed SPS tank, they don't save a ton by not buying bulbs because people generally do not hold onto the same LED long enough. In fact, many add t5's to take care of shadowing.

So it just depends, I would not discount as t5 being more expensive in every case. Depends if a person buys main brand led vs the cheaper brands, if they change bulbs every 6 months or every 12 months (some do 18), and how long they hold on their led's. If they upgrade every gen or even every few gen (which many do, some even upgrade every generation), then cost of LED gets pretty expensive compared to bulbs if they are running a lot of fixtures for coverage.

Now softy/LPS/mixed tanks can get away with less led fixtures ofc which makes led more attractive.

There are other negatives to t5 such as perhaps heating up your house/apartment to consider ofc. That is why I got rid of mine as the house I rent is old and the cooling basically sucks in my house which makes it uncomfortable in summer to have a t5 blasting. Otherwise t5 gave me the most consistent/easy results to grow whatever and bulb cost isn't even a factor to me. I bought my t5 fixture used for $200 and it covers a 4 foot tank to grow anything, cheap as heck way to get happy corals. I now have two radions I bought used for $750 including the hanging stuff and two xr15 isn't enough for SPS dominant so its less powerful then the original t5 (I keep softies/lps now but had a full mix under t5). It would be 4 years of bulb changes to break even (not taking into account electricity cost to be fair). After 4 years, I would want to replace my LED's anyways as the components do wear. That is hoping they don't break after the warranty as the parts are not easily serviceable by just anyone. The t5 components can all be bought and replaced by just about anyone so the fixture should last as long as parts exist.

But you are talking about buying 6 corals... which is an extra cost vs just buying one which again will favor t5/Mh if you don't have to buy 6 just to keep one happy. Bulbs are often cheaper then corals these days.

Idk.. I guess I am saying I would not discount t5 immediately depending on the situation. Especially if you are struggling with understanding par/placement.

Also buying a par meter is probably a better investment then buying 6 corals every time but it still means understanding par.

Oh god that was too long of a post.

 

[peterhos]

No it was extremely thoughtful. Thank you all.