[squishylittlefishies]

I don't really get it. I know that most people like LED lights, but is there some reason tou NEED LED, or is it mostly aesthetic, because it makes colors bright. I'm starting up a 2.5 gallon pico reef with beginner corals(zoos, button polyps) and mushrooms. It was a fw tank, and the light for it is a 15 watt compact flourescent. Is that enough for these corals in 2.5 gallons? it is 60 hertz and 120 volts, although I don't think that's important. How many watts of light per gallon do you need? That's about 7. Also, does anyone know any non-stinging coral for a tiny reef?
Thank you sooo much!!!

 

[funkman262]

Do you have any experience with reef tanks? If not, I really would't suggest doing a picotank because they're extremely unstable. You'd need an automatic topoff just to prevent salinity swings.

As far as lighting, LEDs are popular because they radiate much less heat into the tank (not to mention the electricity savings on larger tanks :lol. The issue with the metal halides and T5s that have been the standard for reefs is that they produce so much heat that often times a chiller is required. They also don't utilize PUR very efficiently (because a lot of the PAR is in the wrong spectrum) but your fixture can be much more efficient per watt when choosing the wavelengths used. I have a 72W Cree LED fixture that I custom built myself using 12 whites dimmable and 12 blues fixed. It's nice being able to adjust the white for both intensity and color control.

 

[squishylittlefishies]

never mind about the anemone btw. I wanted one to host sexies but they eat zoos so i'm not getting them.
Yes, this is my first reef tank, but I'm the kind of person who will do nonstop research for months in advance until I knoe EVERYTHING abouth the things I'm considering. Plus, I allready have the 2.5 and will not upgrade.
So, will my compact florescent work with the corals I chose? I'm not quite clear on your answer yet(still learning the marine language ! )
Thanks for the info so far!

 

[Reefing Madness]

Aquarium Lighting, Light Information; Reef & Planted, PAR, Watt, Kelvin.
What Your Coral Needs | Successful Reef Keeping
CFL won't work, its the wrong type of light.

 

[squishylittlefishies]

I don't get it! i mean light is light right? why does it matter besides colour? Works fine for aquarium plants! grrrr corals are soooo confusing. are LEDS the only ones that work? why not CFs?
thanks!

 

[squishylittlefishies]

Oh yeah, I do have an LED party bulb...
it has a remote contol. You can make it brighter or faded. It can do many shades of white, green, blues, pinks, and yellow. Now that would make a beautifully stunning display!
BUT... it's only 10 watts. :-( That probaby won't cut it ( 4 watts per gallon?)
-maybe I could find a way to use both...
-Maybe the 30 watts of light from my ceiling light will make up for the low bulb wattage. It is a clear glass top tank.
-I could put it by a window.

Help me out here please!

 

[Reefing Madness]

LEDs
Metal Halides
T-5

 

[squishylittlefishies]

Ok, heres what I did. I put the LED into the lamp. I figured it would be the best option because I can give them a propper nightime transition with the dimmer. Altough the wattage is low, the tank is so shallow (8 inches) that when sitting up on the live rock the corals will be so close to the light. They'll basically be getting all 10 watts directly i think! I have heard about reflectors and I'm not sure what they are, but I lined the upper side of the light fixture with tinfoil so that more light bounces into the tank. All the corals I'm really interested in are low-light: mushrooms, button polyps, kenya trees, xenia, etc...
Do you think this will work out?
Do you have any more reccomendations to get more light? should I put it by my window or by my fw tank to share light? will having a screen or glass top limit the ammount of light for my coral? I can feed them too if it will help them grow betetr!
Thanks you so much!!!

 

[Reefing Madness]

Get this. Probelm solved.
LED Spotlight IP65 Waterproof RGB Colour Changing LED Floodlight 10W 20W 30W 50W | eBay

 

[squishylittlefishies]

no thanks, I really can'tt buy a new light, just wondering if mine will do. If not, maybe I will just stick with the shrooms. Could I try a really small group of sun coral? They are non-photosynthetic, and as far as I can tell the only issue is feeding. I spot feed all of my fish anyway, so this won'y be a big problem for me.
Thanks again!

 

[Reefing Madness]

 

[squishylittlefishies]

ummm... blank post↑
will my LED work though, because if not I need to know BEFORE I spend hundreds of dollars on corals to kill.
I was also considering toadstool and green stars. Are those ok? Oh yeah, my bulb is called Kuler Bulb... you can look it up and tell me what you think. Should I have it by the window?
Thanks!

 

[funkman262]

Hundreds of dollars in a 2.5g? :shock2:

How many corals do you think you can possibly fit in there? Corals need space. Not just space to grow, but space to avoid both physical and chemical warfare. I still don't think you should even attempt a picoreef, especially with zero reef experience, but if you do, only put one variety of coral with maybe a couple species. For example, you can do a couple zoanthid species. Toadstools can grow massive, and will also release massive toxins, especially when sick which will easily kill everything else in such a small tank. If you've done "non-stop research" you would already have this basic understanding of the corals you're interested in. Also, with the smallest amount of nano-reef research you'd know that picoreefs are left for the very experienced reefers. Experienced reefers will always suggest that a newbie start with as large a tank as possible (typically 50g+) because they're much more forgiving. I'm sorry for being so harsh but somebody needs to. I really don't see this ending well for you.

 

[squishylittlefishies]

Hundreds of dollars in a 2.5g?
How many corals do you think you can possibly fit in there?I still don't think you should even attempt a picoreef, especially with zero reef experience, but if you do, only put one variety of coral with maybe a couple species. For example, you can do a couple zoanthid species. Toadstools can grow massive, and will also release massive toxins, especially when sick which will easily kill everything else in such a small tank. If you've done "non-stop research" you would already have this basic understanding of the corals you're interested in. Also, with the smallest amount of nano-reef research you'd know that picoreefs are left for the very experienced reefers. Experienced reefers will always suggest that a newbie start with as large a tank as possible (typically 50g+) because they're much more forgiving. I'm sorry for being so harsh but somebody needs to. I really don't see this ending well for you.

Yeah, I was exaggerating about the "hundreds of dollars" probably most of my coral will be on live rock hitchiking(always trying to find things with'bonuses') cuz I'm cheap like that. I'll probably spend more like 30$ MAX. I have been doing lots of nonstop research on everything else...The toadstools are the ones I just Barely found out about. Yeah, I just saw them on a list of beginer nano corals and they looked pretty so I threw it into my post. thank you SOO MUCH for correcting me though! I will deff not include it. I'm still in the baby steps of my 'nonstop research' as you can tell from my confused posts. Don't worry, I'll still be doing much more before I add anything, but I'd really like to try the pico- can't upgrade, but I'm willing and able to put the extra work into this. I have actually read many stories of beginners sucessfully running picos! Thank you for your honest opinion.
What about small groups of the other corals? Lighting ok? Window?
Thankyouthankyouthanks!

 

[squishylittlefishies]

I can see it now reefing madness! Your post was a big good luck smilie! Before it was showing up as a blank post on my screen so I was really confused!
haha, thanks!

 

[RSully]

I can't wait to see how this turns out.

 

[squishylittlefishies]

THANKS! i'm trying to post some pics of the tank with the diff colors from the LED. It looks pretty good so far... Except that the water is a solid white colour from the sand! I'm excited!

 

[cwmorrow]

Aquarium Lighting, Light Information; Reef & Planted, PAR, Watt, Kelvin.
What Your Coral Needs | Successful Reef Keeping
CFL won't work, its the wrong type of light.

The author says water freezes at 0 K.
Water freezes at 273 K.