Suggestions on lights for a Mangrove setup?

[SauceyReef]

Suggestions on lights for a nano peninsula mangrove tank? I have a 15.2 waterbox peninsula cycled and dedicated for mangroves. I just want to get everything situated before adding them. I would prefer to put the Mangroves in the DT, but would like that light to be sufficient for corals as well - (trying to do a softy/mangrove peninsula lagoon). I could possibly have two light fixtures and grow them in the back chambers!

Any suggestions on a light would be incredibly helpful. I am getting confused with what type of lights / preset they would actually like the most. I have heard really high PAR - upwards to 400-600?

 

[GHOSTLY]

My lfs has a mangrove tank that uses an ai prime in the white spectrum and greens with reds. Very little blue

 

[SauceyReef]

My lfs has a mangrove tank that uses an ai prime in the white spectrum and greens with reds. Very little blue

Would you mind letting me know the LFS city/name? I may reach out to them and ask for their preset. Curious how big is the mangrove?

Hopefully someone else can chime in with a potential preset on a AI Prime that is suitable for both mangroves and corals.

 

[GHOSTLY]

Would you mind letting me know the LFS city/name? I may reach out to them and ask for their preset. Curious how big is the mangrove?

Hopefully someone else can chime in with a potential preset on a AI Prime that is suitable for both mangroves and corals.

There's 2 of them vut they're both in canada. My friend has mangroves and i wouldn't mind asking him

 

[SauceyReef]

There's 2 of them vut they're both in canada. My friend has mangroves and i wouldn't mind asking him

Thank you! Hey I can still call them easily so if you remember the names/cities feel free to share! And awesome that would be very helpful. At this point I just want to study the presets/lightning frequencies of those with successful mangrove trees.

 

[GHOSTLY]

Canada corals. They don't have a mangrove tank but they have a like 2000g tank with stingrays, corals, and mangroves.

 

[Ichtha_yo Stuff]

I have a Waterbox 16 Mini that I have mangroves and rock flower, ricorida and palys in. I run two lights. An AI prime for the coral and an grow light pendent I got from Amazon. I have a thread you can check it out. I run a whiter spectrum during the day and a heavy blue in the evening so I can enjoy the flowers and rics.

 

[KonradTO]

Don't waste money on pricey fancy light fixture. Plants grow well under 6500k bulbs (led or gas bulbs), the more wattage the better. I had red mangroves years ago and they were growing well under a 100w gas bulb (like t5 but with e27 plug).

 

[KonradTO]

Don't waste money on pricey fancy light fixture. Plants grow well under 6500k bulbs (led or gas bulbs), the more wattage the better. I had red mangroves years ago and they were growing well under a 100w gas bulb (like t5 but with e27 plug).

 

[KonradTO]

Don't waste money on pricey fancy light fixture. Plants grow well under 6500k bulbs (led or gas bulbs), the more wattage the better. I had red mangroves years ago and they were growing well under a 100w gas bulb (like t5 but with e27 plug).

 

[KonradTO]

Lol my smartphone funked up

 

[rhizotron]

Some time I grew some nice mangroves in a tank that just had a couple of 6,500K T5 strips. I had read you need to blast the trees with lots of light, but I found they grew very well with this moderate illumination.

 

[SauceyReef]

I have a Waterbox 16 Mini that I have mangroves and rock flower, ricorida and palys in. I run two lights. An AI prime for the coral and an grow light pendent I got from Amazon. I have a thread you can check it out. I run a whiter spectrum during the day and a heavy blue in the evening so I can enjoy the flowers and rics.

hey thank you for chiming in! Are the mangroves in the DT? Do you think the grow light or the AI Primes is doing more for the mangroves?

 

[SauceyReef]

Don't waste money on pricey fancy light fixture. Plants grow well under 6500k bulbs (led or gas bulbs), the more wattage the better. I had red mangroves years ago and they were growing well under a 100w gas bulb (like t5 but with e27 plug).

haha all good it happens. The thing is I want corals + mangroves so I think it would be easier just to get an AI Prime and rig high white, red, green settings? And maybe transition to more blue later on for some coral colors.

 

[SauceyReef]

Some time I grew some nice mangroves in a tank that just had a couple of 6,500K T5 strips. I had read you need to blast the trees with lots of light, but I found they grew very well with this moderate illumination.

Do you think it had high white spectrums? May not always be the overall intensity but the color spectrum and dominating color intensities.

 

[KonradTO]

haha all good it happens. The thing is I want corals + mangroves so I think it would be easier just to get an AI Prime and rig high white, red, green settings? And maybe transition to more blue later on for some coral colors.

I am no experienced on the coral side for sure, but if it was me I would use 6500k for both corals and mangroves and add some t5 actinic or royal blue while you are at home in the evenings just for the sake of the eye. Corals can thrive at 6500k, just colors look bad under whites..

 

[SauceyReef]

I am no experienced on the coral side for sure, but if it was me I would use 6500k for both corals and mangroves and add some t5 actinic or royal blue while you are at home in the evenings just for the sake of the eye. Corals can thrive at 6500k, just colors look bad under whites..

I will admit my lack of understanding of the complexities of lights. There is PAR, K, Light type, etc. Would a AI Prime 16 HD cover the 6500k needed? I like LEDs a lot and the look / customizability of the primes.

 

[KonradTO]

I will admit my lack of understanding of the complexities of lights. There is PAR, K, Light type, etc. Would a AI Prime 16 HD cover the 6500k needed? I like LEDs a lot and the look / customizability of the primes.

I would wait for some more experienced reefers on giving you some help on this. As far as I understood the AI primes leds should have enough channels to match the spectrum (put simple, light color) that you want. I don't know if they go low enough in temperature to match terrestrial plant requirements though. My view on the high-end light fixtures like the AI's is that maybe for corals are the best choice in terms of light/coral growth/look of the tank(!), but when it comes to plants like mangroves you definitely do not need to spend all that money for a light fixture. if the main "aim" of the tank is mangroves I would get a simple and cheap 6500k led floodlight and place it above the mangroves. If then you see that corals struggle with 6500k light or you don't like the colors you can always add another more blue fixture over the corals and keep the 6500k light or use it for other purposes (they are quite cheap).
Consider that in many corals are found already at 20-30cm depth so they basically get white light, they thrive but obviously in terms of colors they don't look as nice as they would under blue/violet light

 

[SauceyReef]

I would wait for some more experienced reefers on giving you some help on this. As far as I understood the AI primes leds should have enough channels to match the spectrum (put simple, light color) that you want. I don't know if they go low enough in temperature to match terrestrial plant requirements though. My view on the high-end light fixtures like the AI's is that maybe for corals are the best choice in terms of light/coral growth/look of the tank(!), but when it comes to plants like mangroves you definitely do not need to spend all that money for a light fixture. if the main "aim" of the tank is mangroves I would get a simple and cheap 6500k led floodlight and place it above the mangroves. If then you see that corals struggle with 6500k light or you don't like the colors you can always add another more blue fixture over the corals and keep the 6500k light or use it for other purposes (they are quite cheap).
Consider that in many corals are found already at 20-30cm depth so they basically get white light, they thrive but obviously in terms of colors they don't look as nice as they would under blue/violet light

I understand that corals would still potentially thrive with a cheaper 6500k light. I Just want more of a middle ground as I know others have kept successful mangrove trees with LED setups. It is the programability that is pushing me to get a nicer LED with presets. I can have the mangrove happy most of the day and create a preset to transition to heavier blues at night to see some coral colors. You cant really do that with a single clip on light with zero programability as well as it may work. Appreciate you chiming in. I am hoping more people with experience chime in, but this is like my 7th post now about this. I am finding a lot of help looking at other posts and seeing what has worked well for others. I almost want to start making a chart of people with successful mangrove trees, and what lights they are using. I think the range of success would be quite large in terms of different lights from what I am seeing. I have heard from quite a few people now that just get heavy whites, greens, and reds and I will be looking good for lights they like.

 

[KonradTO]

I understand that corals would still potentially thrive with a cheaper 6500k light. I Just want more of a middle ground as I know others have kept successful mangrove trees with LED setups. It is the programability that is pushing me to get a nicer LED with presets. I can have the mangrove happy most of the day and create a preset to transition to heavier blues at night to see some coral colors.

Yes definitely if you want programability and you are not ad DIYer then I agree with your choice. If there is the possibility to run the white channel with a decent intensity it sounds quite interesting what you want to do. Worst case scenario you can add an additional bulb over the mangrove for little money and run the AI with blue mainly (green leaves look awful under blue light)
A problem I had with mangroves (in freshwater!) was that they grew quite fast and at some point they were taller than my light fixture so I needed to add an additional light just for them. Not sure if you can prune them..