Light settings/coral placement advice.

[rharter]

I recently added some new corals to my 20g peninsula tank and now I'm questioning my lighting schedule. I moved all of my Zoa plugs to a Zoa rock at the bottom, and they're not opening up, so I'm concerned that my lights might be too intense. I've also noticed a Hammer that I moved has one polyp that's looking pretty emaciated, so perhaps I should turn it so it doesn't have one pointing away from the light?

Here is a look at my Zoa rock.

Here's my Hammers weak side on the left.

Here's the whole tank for context.

And here are my AI Prime settings. You can see the levels across the top which is at the peak at 10:40 AM.

I'd appreciate anyone sharing their expertise. I'd love to get an idea of whether this is a lighting issue and how I should go about testing and figuring out a good lighting schedule or move things, since I don't want to play with it so much that it stresses things out.

 

[Unenabled]

I don't have a lot of experience with this kind of stuff yet, but I do have the exact same light that you have. How long have you had your corals and how long have you had the lights that high? Most people tend to nuke their tank with their lights when they first set them up. What I did was start out with the lights at like 10% (all of them except the greens and reds) and I brought them up by like 2-5% after each weekly water change. When I got my zoas in, my lighting was at 15% for each color used and they opened immediately. I then noticed that they seemed to all be stretching towards the light so I waited a week and upped the lights from 15% to 19% (which was a more drastic change compared to the 2% change each week for about a month). After that they all opened and stopped stretching toward the light; I even saw faster growth with new heads appearing wayyyy faster than before. With steady increase I didn't stress my other corals and I gave them time to get used to the change. If you think your zoas are getting too much light, don't just bring it down drastically. Do the opposite of what I did: bring the lights down by like 2-5% (or whatever you think isn't too drastic) and see how your corals react for a week or so.
As for the hammer, it could be getting too much flow, that tends to damage the polyps and expose the skeleton. I have mine on the bottom for this exact reason. It ensures that it gets moderate flow for a little movement, without too much to damage it.
Btw that toadstool is magnificent, I can't wait for mine to grow like that!


This is my current schedule. Wednesday is water change day so I will probably up all of the 22%s to 25%.

 

[Unenabled]

since I don't want to play with it so much that it stresses things out.

I agree. Messing with the lights too much is a good way to kill your corals and stress out your fish. At least that's why I've heard a lot online. I love the AI Prime lighting but whenever I make a new schedule I have to quickly turn all of the lights to 0 because I don't think my corals can handle the lights at 100% (or ever really, I don't agree with high lighting). Its such a great light but making new schedules is such a pain.

 

[rharter]

Thanks for the info about your approach to finding the right lighting. My settings were based off of one of the AI Prime signature series, though I brought them down a little. I like your idea of bringing them down a little over time to see where things land. I think I'll do that, though I'm thinking I might go a little faster than weekly, since it sounds like too much light is much more harmful than too little. I'd hate to burn out my corals while slowly trying to find the right mix!

 

[Unenabled]

Thanks for the info about your approach to finding the right lighting. My settings were based off of one of the AI Prime signature series, though I brought them down a little. I like your idea of bringing them down a little over time to see where things land. I think I'll do that, though I'm thinking I might go a little faster than weekly, since it sounds like too much light is much more harmful than too little. I'd hate to burn out my corals while slowly trying to find the right mix!

Most corals from farms are usually grown in low light. At least that’s where they store them after fragging and before shipping to retailers and online buyers alike. So it’s not like giving your corals too little light would make that much of a difference. The only thing that would be affected with too little light would just be growth, but that doesn’t really matter when you are trying to stabilize everything and get your lighting perfect.

I have a buddy who dims his lights by like 50% whenever he gets a new coral for the first few weeks. He does this cuz he once bought a frag (I think it was one of the more expensive softies cuz he payed like 600 for a 1 inch frag) that bleached in like an hour because the lights were too high and it couldn’t handle it. That might be extreme and you probably don’t have to worry about that considering most people aren’t gonna risk spending that kind of money on a single frag.

But I’ve had incredible growth so far from just slowly bringing the lights up. I started with like 13 or so zoa heads and now I’m at like 26. I’ve only had the corals in for a month and the tank for 3 months. I think doubling the population in a month in a brand new tank is pretty dang good, not trying to brag or anything. I think once you find that sweet spot with your lighting you’ll see your zoas start to take off, considering you have so many currently and many different types.

sorry for the long butt essay lol