Thoughts on this lighting schedule?

[cryptics]

I was reading a book on coral farming. I am not planning to be a vendor or anything (trade most stuff) but we all want to see our corals grow and I figured I may learn something. In a small chapter he went into this 4 hours on 8 hours off lighting method. It is based on studies he says shows best coral growth is between 2 1/2 and 4 hours of the light being on. That in itself is intriguing but i instantly thought this may solve a problem i have. My tanks are in the basement which does not have air conditioning. The windows wouldn't allow me to run a vent out. I know I could run a split out but the basement is unfinished except for 20% which is my office with the tanks. Don't want to drop the cash on a split until I finish the basement. Chillers don't work because it cools the tank but the chiller heats the room up a lot which then heats the tank agin and so on down the spiral. I basically use fans controlled to come on when when the tank gets hot. I run T5's. I had LEDs which did run cooler but I didn't like the growth with them and T5's aren't that much hotter. I am thinking if I ran the lights on the frag tank from 7:30am - 11:30am then 7:30pm - 11:30pm I may get increased growth according to the studies the book noted and also have my lights off during the hottest parts of the day.

Thoughts???

 

[jerl77]

i cut my halides down to 4 hours a day and i have to say the corals look better

 

[CHEMCHEF]

i cut my halides down to 4 hours a day and i have to say the corals look better

HALIDES!!!!!! What is this you speak of??? You're the t5 king. No?

 

[jerl77]

lol still have t5s in the halide fixturerangehat

HALIDES!!!!!! What is this you speak of??? You're the t5 king. No?

 

[Jaftica]

lol still have t5s in the halide fixturerangehat

And LEDS too! lol

 

[jerl77]

Lol
LEDs for life

 

[Mattl22]

Oh boy !!

 

[nanoreefer22]

Interesting...I'd be up for giving this a shot, might make the fish go bananas though...

Run from 7am - 11am..then 7pm - 10:30pm. This would be pretty cool, allowing 8 hours of light and during the coolest parts of the day. Did it mention how this affects fish?

 

[cryptics]

Here is the article this is based off. http://www.tau.ac.il/lifesci/departments/zoology/members/benayahu/documents/93.pdf

I did a google search earlier and found a bunch of people trying this. I have read through a few. Most said they saw increased growth. None that I saw yet reported adverse effects. What i am worried about is my fish in there. People have stated they are fine but still worried I am going to drive them crazy.

Going to try this starting tomorrow. I will let you guys know how it goes.

 

[jerl77]

My fish have been fine and yes I see better color and growth with less light

 

[BaaMNYC]

Tagging along. Very interesting. Only wonder how to set this on a rkl

 

[fishman1069]

I'm tagging along also. I read something about this a while ago. I don't remember where or the name of the article but I do remember something about coral only using 4 hours of light. It would be nice to be able to cut down on the heat and electricity

 

[Mattl22]

I also remember seeing this few yrs ago never really took off though I wonder if there is any threads out there with ppl who have tried it ! If anything I would think sps Would benefit from this !

 

[BaaMNYC]

Has anyone tried this long term successfully?

 

[prattreef]

Which Book on Coral Farming is this idea taken from?

 

[cryptics]

Practical Coral Farming by Miguel Tolosa Expanded Second Edition.

The article it is based on is here

Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology
298 (2004) 35?48
http://www.tau.ac.il/lifesci/departments/zoology/members/benayahu/documents/93.pdf

 

[prattreef]

Though I am far from a scientist, I fail to see how one can use a single scientific study whose intent has nothing to do with coral growth--it is about the internal biological clock of one particular species of Zoox, in one particular soft coral, to extrapolate a rationale for radically rethinking that way we light our tanks.

Whether or not this makes coral grow faster I can't say, but I can say with extreme confidence that I do not know a single advanced aquarist ( and I humbly submit I know most of the nationally respected folks personally) that practices this approach.

And let me be clear here-- cutting down photoperiod or cutting down the time of the intense lights but still running other lighting is not what is being suggested here.

 

[PHILYD1]

I think this is popular in coral farms, the idea is that they are squeezing 2 photo periods into one day, pretty much tricking the coral to believe its a new day 8 hours later

 

[prattreef]

I think if you keep fish too--particularly ones that bury at night, this is a pretty bad idea.

 

[reefs4life]

If you want to talk about it in biological terms, supposedly growth occurs during the non-photo period, hence lights off.
Considering that in nature the most intense light is probably around 6 hours or so cutting it down to 4 shouldn't be much of an issue and you will be squeezing in two "growth periods" into a single day. You could even do 6 on, 6 off twice and there's a full day.
I've been doing this on my 3G nano and it works out pretty well for me because it becomes a good alarm clock in the morning but then they're on again when I get home. But then again, all I have in the tank are little frags, so I'm not sure how it would work with fish.