What par levels for mixed reef?

cedwards04 · Dec 12, 2019

Set up a new tank (48×24×20 nuvo 100 ext) in august. Long story short, I am looking for recommended target par values for a lps dominated mixed reef. There are some zoas in there, and will be some sps added eventually.

I think I started out with too much light and cooked most of what I transferred over from my other tank. Using an apogee mq210 par meter, I was getting well over 200 par at the sandbed and 550 in the middle of the water column.

Lighting setup is a pair of hydra26hd's (ab+ spectrum) and a 36" t5/led hybrid fixture running 4 ati blue plus bulbs.

I own half of the par meter, the other half is owned by my lfs, we rent it out and split the money to help me pay for my coral addiction haha. So I wanted to try and get my lights setup properly before I return it to the store.

LiveWire · Dec 12, 2019

This should help out.

DSEKULA · Dec 12, 2019

Wow, that is alot of light my friend!
My knee jerk reaction is that you are correct and it is too much. My mixed reef is set up specific to keep zoas, euphelia, and acros. The higher areas in the tank run high 200s to mid 300s par with mid 100s on the sandbed. Theres certainly not just one right way to run a reef but that has been going well for me. If you have pieces in your tank that are doing well you should slowly change levels though, a radical change could be quite a shock.

cedwards04 · Dec 12, 2019

Maybe I will shoot for 120-150 on the sand bed and go from there.

cedwards04 · Dec 12, 2019

Played around with the lights and par meter tonight. I started out with my lights mounted about 8" off the tank. I had a lot of hot spots and was really having trouble dialing the lights in. Trying to get par where I wanted on the sandbed lead to some spots in the tank with almost no par while others were upwards of 300.

I decided to raise the light fixture in an attempt to distribute the light better and try to get rid of the dead zone in the center of the tank. I moved it up to 12" over the tank and wow what a difference. I now have almost completely even par readings from side to side and front to back. I will attach some of my notes for you guys to review and make suggestions on.

I settled for now on running the hydras at 50% intensity with the t5's kicking on from 1pm to 6pm. Let me know what you guys think. I am open to suggestion.