SPS acclimation question

[ronj]

i am wondering about acclimating my sps frags from VHO lighting to MH lighting..should i put them all the way on the bottom of the tank for the switch over???? also, how long should they stay lowered??? i was talking with Sue T before..she was saying that it was possible on some tanks to gradually lower the lights...i built my canopy with an open top..i am able to raise my lights a bit if i need to..i can only raise them a few inches though, or it will light up my living room .any thoughts????

 

[Krish]

I think some people use eggcrate over their tanks to limit the light to acclimate them, but never tried it before...

 

[mmkeeper]

Eggcrate will defuse the light some. You could also shorten the photo period.

 

[ronj]

so would i still need to move the corals near or onto the bottom???

 

[cheeks69]

If your corals aren't encrusted on the rocks then moving them down would be an option, I find that reducing the photoperiod will work just as well. What are the dimensions of your tank ? How many watts were the VHO's ? How many watts will you be running of MH's ?

 

[ronj]

my dimensions are 72L 22H 18W.....the VHO's are 3-130W...my new MH are 3-250W...they will be about 7-10" above the waterline..none of the corals have encrusted yet..

 

[cheeks69]

That's a drastic increase :exclaim: I would definately reduce the photoperiod and lower them since your sig. indicates you have all softies, it could take quite some time for them to acclimate to your lighting. This is what happens if you don't aclimate properly

 

[ronj]

that sucks...did they die????? how fast did you acclimate them??? that's funny, i was editing my signature when you were typing....i have all sps frags and 2 figi leathers..i removed all of my other softies..i will definately move the softies to the bottom...should i put the sps frags down there as well???

 

[cheeks69]

Well I didn't aclimate much I just switched from a coralife 12k to the XM 10k and reduced the photoperiod to 6 hours for a week and then returned to my regular 10 hours as you can see it wasn't long enough ! I lost several acropora frags but the Montiporas eventually did recover.

 

[ronj]

all you did was change bulb colors and it did that??????? i didn't know you had to acclimate them to different color temps

 

[auqua man]

Well I didn't aclimate much I just switched from a coralife 12k to the XM 10k and reduced the photoperiod to 6 hours for a week and then returned to my regular 10 hours as you can see it wasn't long enough ! I lost several acropora frags but the Montiporas eventually did recover.

I just swiched from coralife 10,000k to megachrome 14,500k I did not know it could do that my lites are on 10 hrs a day normaly how much should I cut that back.:doubt:

 

[cheeks69]

all you did was change bulb colors and it did that??????? i didn't know you had to acclimate them to different color temps

The problem was that there was a drastic difference in PAR between the bulbs. The CV 12k had a PAR of 252 on my ballast whereas the XM 10k has a PAR of 571.

 

[ronj]

i have never heard of that before...do you also have to acclimate them even if you are replacing an old bulb with a new one with the exact same color temp???

 

[cheeks69]

I just swiched from coralife 10,000k to megachrome 14,500k I did not know it could do that my lites are on 10 hrs a day normaly how much should I cut that back.:doubt:

Since my experience I will usually reduce the photoperiod when changing bulbs to 6 hrs and slowly increase depending on how the corals react.

 

[ronj]

i am going to start a thread about reducing the photoperiods..i want to see how long everybody keeps the period shortened...thanks for the help!!!!!

 

[cheeks69]

Here's the thread with my experience http://www.reeffrontiers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=8112&highlight=corals+losing+color

 

[DonW]

I just swiched from coralife 10,000k to megachrome 14,500k I did not know it could do that my lites are on 10 hrs a day normaly how much should I cut that back.:doubt:

You dont need to worry about it. You went the other direction. 10K's are more intense than the 14K's.

Don

 

[CarlaW]

In the past, I have just put the frags on the bottom and moved them up slowly over a month's period.

 

[cheeks69]

You dont need to worry about it. You went the other direction. 10K's are more intense than the 14K's.

Don

Well that depends on the bulb and ballast you're running. On my reeffanatic EB the aquaconnect 14k has more PAR than most 10k's. Also keep in mind that bulbs will lose intensity as time goes on so a year old 10k could have considerable less PAR than a brand new higher K bulb.

 

[DonW]

Well that depends on the bulb and ballast you're running. On my reeffanatic EB the aquaconnect 14k has more PAR than most 10k's. Also keep in mind that bulbs will lose intensity as time goes on so a year old 10k could have considerable less PAR than a brand new higher K bulb.

The coralife that he asked about will loose par by going to the 14K. Yours are one of the only combos that will compete with 10K's as far as par goes.

Don