Variable Lighting Intensity and Increasing Growth

[Newb73]

I have been experimenting with variable lighting intensity for some time now and have gotten what I consider to be acceptable growth in the early testing and am now adding more SPS to my 2 year old tank in what may end up being a more extensive test.

I know there is at least one coral farm which oscillates its light intensity from very high par numbers to very low par numbers throughout the day.

I have also read that sps do a fair amount of their encrusting at night. I have even seen split schedules where they run day and night cycles 12 hours at a time instead of 24 hours.

I have long ran pretty regular cloud simulation which effectively varies the light about 50% of the time on an hour to hour basis, and even within that, I have higher periods of brightness oscilate through the day even with the cloud simulation.

I do for slightly different reasons as I am attempting to get some extra light to some of the corals on the bottom and corners, but in a way that wont just fry zoas and lps.

It is a unique challenge as I am doing a mixed reef and most either go lps or sps these days.

At any rate, I am wondering if anyone knows of any actual science between these ideas....theoretical or practical.

I consider the coral farm that does it to already be one practical example.

Thanks everyone.

 

[oreo54]

Most speculation would lead to biological saturation points where an organism can no longer "gather" more light due to clogged pathways or lack of needed intermediary compounds..
Giving a break allows flushing of the photon, re-accumulating precursor molecules and re-grouping...

Of course there is a lot of species dependence, like shade tolerant vs full light plants or corals..

On another speculative point, don't see high light-low light to be much different than plain old medium light..
Of course high light "damage" may initiate protective pigments..

 

[Newb73]

Well this is only anecdotal but i have one monti which colors up nicely with very high par and another one that bleaches then colors in with low par.

I have zoas that die under high par and orher zoas that seem unaffected.

I have one of each for gsp as well.

My multiple torches seem less impacted by high par than my Duncan.

 

[Salty1962]

Curious, where did you read that acro's do a fair amount of their encrusting at night?

 

[Newb73]

Curious, where did you read that acro's do a fair amount of their encrusting at night?

Thats a good thing to question because i picked it up years ago from a forum member here, but I've idea if it was accurate....i just took it on face value and didn't argue.

Imagine that.

The context was in relation to the practice of dosing alk at night and a member posted NOT to use an ovely calm "night mode" for wave makers stating the low flow disrupted encrustation which they said occured "mostly at night".

 

[Salty1962]

Thats a good thing to question because i picked it up years ago from a forum member here, but I've idea if it was accurate....i just took it on face value and didn't argue.

Imagine that.

The context was in relation to the practice of dosing alk at night and a member posted NOT to use an ovely calm "night mode" for wave makers stating the low flow disrupted encrustation which they said occured "mostly at night".

Thx for the reply!

 

[billwill]

I was watching a video with Mike Paletta (American reef channel) and he was talking about how he and Sanjay were doing this very thing.

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Following along.

A fwiw. Read Randy Farleys photosynthesis article. I belive the experiment is basically the rest period to stimulate zooox , also ME Riddles 350 par for growth and higher for coloration. They are trying to capture the best of both worlds basically, as I understand it.

 

[Newb73]

Those 350 par levels make my red monti deep and beautiful and slow down the growth of one green monti while causing yet another monti to fade out badly.

So I have been playing with this. This week I started actually running the peak par in the hottest part of the tank around 110 on MWF and I am running it at 250+ with intermittent cloud simulation (so it gets hit with the 250+ a little over 50% of the day on Tue, Thur, Sat and Sun (Yes I love my apex)).

Almost immediately the faded monty started getting it super dark color back. The growth of the other green monti accelerated.

My high light loving birds nest does not appear to have its growth appreciably decelerated by the maneuver either as it is growing just as fast as it did under high light (possibly faster).

I have Yellow and purple Acro that always has lots of polyp extension and grows so slowly, that I honestly can not appreciably tell any difference at all...although I assume the intermittent lower par levels are in fact slowing them.... it is only a guess.

The benefit here is that (for a mixed reef) my sps and zoas are once again also growing....as I had completely stunted them under higher par levels and was possibly even killing one of my zoas.

I might accept slower growth in a few sps if it means better growth and color in others...while allowing me not to have to move my zoas and sps to another tank

 

[Larry L]

What does your lighting schedule look like?

 

[Fudsey]

What are you using for lights?

 

[JoeKelley]

I saw this Mike Palletta video as well as remember and David Saxby describing online his LED schedule with peaks and valleys throughout the days photo period. Dana has a method to measure light per day, maybe this is the baseline to begin. I don't have a PAR meter. Interested to see what you guys come up with.

Joe

 

[Fudsey]

I've been running a peak and valley LED schedule since I got my Hydra HDs once I found a nice looking schedule. It is still based on a 24 hour day though.

I'd be really interested in seeing how a 12 hour schedule would look and work

 

[tigé21v]

Not sure if you've sen this thread. But he (I'm assuming it's a "he", if not, I apologize) is uses variable light intensities too.
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/better-than-ever-after-tank-crash.332566/

 

[Newb73]

What are you using for lights?

4x A360w, 3x Hydra 52

 

[Newb73]

What does your lighting schedule look like?

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

@Dana Riddle do you have a second to give some input on this method ?

 

[Biologic]

Digging up this thread, because I can see the validity of altering the spectrum and intensity, to mimic how reef conditions change. See the Dana article below.

Imitating Natural Light Quality, Intensity, and Dosage in a Reef Aquarium – Do We Really Want To?

When it comes to reef aquariums, Mother Nature has always been the de facto benchmark aquarists aspire towards. Dana investigates in great detail the quality and quantity of light over natural reefs in order to lay the groundwork to answer the age-old question: what is the best light for...

reefs.com

I know some time has past on this thread. What is the consensus, with regards to SPS, on changing spectrum and intensity like as what nature actually provides. Verses a slow ramp up, constant spectrum, at a set intensity, for example AB+. Or classic MH lighting.

From the article, picture attached. The PAR value changes. We'd see on a natural reef, spectrum would change as well. Its bluer in the morning on a reef, and whiter at mid-day, and bluer in the evening.

 

[atlantean]

Digging up this thread, because I can see the validity of altering the spectrum and intensity, to mimic how reef conditions change. See the Dana article below.

Imitating Natural Light Quality, Intensity, and Dosage in a Reef Aquarium – Do We Really Want To?

When it comes to reef aquariums, Mother Nature has always been the de facto benchmark aquarists aspire towards. Dana investigates in great detail the quality and quantity of light over natural reefs in order to lay the groundwork to answer the age-old question: what is the best light for...

reefs.com

I know some time has past on this thread. What is the consensus, with regards to SPS, on changing spectrum and intensity like as what nature actually provides. Verses a slow ramp up, constant spectrum, at a set intensity, for example AB+. Or classic MH lighting.

From the article, picture attached. The PAR value changes. We'd see on a natural reef, spectrum would change as well. Its bluer in the morning on a reef, and whiter at mid-day, and bluer in the evening.

I was just going to make a post with the same question. I know WWC runs the full spectrum in the morning and blue spectrum for the rest of the day. Static intensity and spectrum seems a bit weird to me.

 

[Biologic]

I was just going to make a post with the same question. I know WWC runs the full spectrum in the morning and blue spectrum for the rest of the day. Static intensity and spectrum seems a bit weird to me.

i agree. My thoughts are — maxing out blue for the duration of the photoperiod. Slow ramp up and then max out green for the duration of the photoperiod. Then whites and red, follows a parabola shape like in the picture I posted from the study of light intensity.

Depending on how Violet and ultra violet is grouped in control, I’d have ultra violet follow intensity of white. Violet would follow something like a blue spectrum.

See my example. I have a Rapid Led Corona. It’s not a very popular light. It’s powerful parwise. About as powerful as a Radion G4. Just not very easy to customize.

You can’t see my whites or my reds, because the purple line covers it. It gets very very white in the day and in the dawn and dusk, more blue. You get a full spectrum and intensity following a natural curve.

**the blue line at the bottom is moon lights. The light blue is ~440-460 nm.


Another thought is that Sanjay runs his EcoTech Radions at 100% intensity. All channels. He wants every photon he paid for.