Moon lighting

[tikki50]

Is moon lighting important?

I noticed places selling these and I figured since I spend so much cash on my tank id like to see it all them time. Even if it has a very dim light to it. I do have a theroy on this.

My theroy

From all my hunting skills that I have complied I have learned that most animals in the wild rely on the moon for guideance when to do certain things. The white tail deer for example use daylight timing and moon phases to start their matting cycle. Now if we in turn use this on an aquarium you could successfully use a moon chart to tell you when moon phases are and address the light accordingly. Meaning some days there would be no moon light at all, other days the moon light and maybe even the Actinics on to simulate a full moon. since the moon rises and fulls at different times these times would constantly change. I think that this might help create a more natural enviornment for the aquarium and even help reproduction to a degree.

What do you think?

 

[Anonymous]

i think it sounds good to me and i'm only waiting for someone to post a good moon schedule......

i wanna moonlight!!

 

[Len]

Moon lighting definitely contributes to my coral's spawning schedule (that, and the variance in temperature). The changes in moon phase and temp are both controlled by my Neptune Aquacontroller. Other then that, though, the corals behave the same with or without the changing moonlight or temp.

My fish aren't affected by the moon cycle at all from what I can tell. Personally, I wouldn't go out of my way to add a correct moon cycle on my tank, but since the Neptune controller has a built in schedule, why not use it?

 

[Len]

By the way, when corals do mass spawn, it causes more problems then benefits and it might actually be one reason to NOT use a moon cycle.

 

[Jolieve]

I don't use a moon cycle per se. I do use a moonlight though. Mine is set up for night viewing of the tank because my lights go off early. I have the lights in the tank set to go on when the fish wake up (the tank room gets lots of indirect sunlight. There's no keeping the fish asleep past 10 am.) Since my lights go out long before I go to bed... moonlight. It lets the fish sleep, and I still get to watch the tank. It also looks cool too

Len knows more about this stuff than I do, but if you just want night viewing of the tank.. having a moonlight rocks.

J.

 

[PilotNY]

I built a moon light made out of 10 LED light hooked to a dimable power supply. I used the 6000 mcd LED's and use a X-10 module to dim it. My ACII also has the moon cycle but I do not use it either. Total cost for light my entire 110 was under 50 bucks. Thanks to Playfair for the design.

Carl