Low Light Corals

[AxelG]

Could anybody recommend some corals that do well in low light and low to moderate current?

Yes, I'll admit it and I know I'm not the only one out there, I only have 80 Watts of standard flourescent lighting (one Corallife 50/50 and one Hagen Power-Glo) for my 55 gallon tank. I'm fairly new to the hobby, nine months now, but fresh water for at least the 15 years. I've somewhat recovered from the sticker shock of reefing but the wife hasn't yet so I can't spend $400 on lighting.

My tank has 35 lbs Live Rock, 75 lbs of nice live sand, Nassarius, Turbo, Astrea and Baha snails, red scarlet reef crabs,Hawaiin black and white hermits, some hairy crabs that hitched a ride in the live rock and a gold robotic looking crab that also hitched a ride, a Chocolate Chip Star, a Yellow Tang, a Percula Clown and a Diadema. It seems to be a nice happy community in there.

A reputable Internet dealer suggested Colt coral (Cladiella sp.). I have an Elephant Ear and several Green Striped Mushrooms that are doing great.

If you could add another shop light and a couple of the GE Ultra 6500K bulbs maybe on the colt. Some of the leathers or cabbage corals might do ok under 160 watt but thats really marginal. You might try finding a used Icecap for around $100 or so, That would jack your light up into the comfort zone.
BTW chocolate chip stars arent the best reef stars, thay have been known to eat corals, HTH

[naser]

well ive seen some pretty fine tanks with low lighting....garf.org has a reef with sps's in only 40 watts. check out that site.. they keep things in 80 watts too...

[odlaw]

Mushrooms like low light. My 30 only had 60 watts and a small bubble coral has done well for a year and a frogspawn. Now that I think about it you can just move some coarls higher up in the tank. If I am right you could have the same corals that you would place on the bottom of your tank with twice the light by placing higher up and half the light. Someone correct me if I'm wrong.

[This message has been edited by odlaw (edited 01-18-2001).]

[tdwyatt]

Hmmmmm....

by small polyp stonies I assume you mean thereef-builders like acropora and montipora spp... hmmmmmm.... low light.... I guess all those eons of evolutionary selection and development since the end of the pleoscene must have changed in the last few months. Seems to me that the sps corals ALL require strong reef top tropical sunlight of high intensity and duration and proper color to be able to survive, much less to thrive. I know of a few "sps" corals that will do ok in intense vho lighting (very shallow placement under icecap powered VHO bulbs, usually 4 placed closely together with good reflectors), and some that will even grow somewhat ( some pocillapora, A. formosa, A. longicyanthus, but mostly montipora spp that do ok with less than an 8 on the scale of 1 to 10 (10 high) for sps corals...) but 2 shop light NO fluorescents are more like a 1 or 2 on the scale of 1 to 10 for lighting. I use NO output bulbs for the mushrooms in my breeder, but even then I use 6 bulbs and 2 pc's in a tank that only has 12 inches of water in a 5 foot length, and then it is to simulate turbid lagoonal water to encourage growth of freshly cut mushroom cuttings... I have to disagree with Naser on keeping stony corals under 80 watts of light. Ultimately, these corals will not receive enough light to survive, and unless almost all of their nutritional needs are being met by prey capturem, their demise would be fairly rapid. When building your microcosm, select a microenvironment that closely matches the type of lighting, water flow and chemistry/biology that you can mimic with your tank, then select creatures that match that environment. Many of the softies will do well in such an environment, as well as the corallimorphs. Think " lagoonal" for your tank, then keep them close to the surface and under the middle sections of the bulbs. Bill-E has some info on bulbs and reflectors from Home Depot that put out a fairly intense light and have the correct color for reefkeeping. It would be possible for you to put several of these over your tank, buying them one at a time as your budget allows, lighting sections of your tank as your collection of species increases. I think that rather than rushing the secletion of new acquisitions, look to using your budget as a means of slowing you down so that you can provide the proper environment for your creatures, and build for the long term habitat development by either buying the pc's at home depot, or saving up to buy the lighting you want and deciding and developing which microcosm you desire to mimic, and read and research the heck out of that microcosm. You might change your mind, but regardless of what microcosm you decide to build, you will be in a much better position to provide for these wonderful creatures than trying to make the creatures you want fit into the environment you have. BTW, I like mushrooms, I propagate many different types of actinodiscus, ricordea, and discosoma spp, and there is a large body of information developing about the propagation and keeping of these low light spp. In addition, there are spp. of azooxanthelic coral that do not require light at all (although with the exception of sun corals, these are generally very difficult to keep unless you have access to a readily available souce of zooplankton). I do not want to discourage you from trying these species, rather , I would greatly encourage you, just be careful of the advice you take: Listen to all of it, then make a decision based on good factual information sources. Even if you decide later to go with a more intensely lit microcosm, you can move your 'shrooms to the ends of the tank and under ledges and overhangs, where even MH lighting won't burn them up.

Sorry for the long post, that's all I seem to do lately, I guess it is having been off-line for so many weeks...(heh heh heh)

Hope this helps you in your quest for corals!


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Tom <"{{{{>(
(TDWyatt)
Wise men talk because they have something to say; fools, because they have to say something. -Plato

[Raszagil]

Hi AxelG!

Yeah that's really not alot of light to work with... button and "regular" polyps would be okay, as would mushrooms. If you had them high on a rock close to the lights green/pink/brown star polyps would be okay too. Maybe a colt coral and some basic leather corals would be okay, if they too are placed high up on the rock work.

I know all about the whole money thing...it's the hardest part to this hobby IMO... I would suggest checking out AHSupply.com and check out their deals...4 96 watters would support plenty of softies.

Good luck and HTHs,

Raz

p.s. I just noticed...you mentioned a chocolate chip starfish...watch out those guys will sometimes eat stuff you might find valuable.

[This message has been edited by Raszagil (edited 01-18-2001).]

[naser]

i myself have 400 watt metal just going on mhat i saw on there web site....dont have to get all defensive...you should check it out you might learn somthing...garf.org

Naser. sorry if you found everyone defensive but its a fact that 80 watts or even 1111160 watts over a 55gallon tank is really dim light in the scheme of things. Consider that the light levels on a tropic reef one hour after sun rise already exceed the levels in a typically Metal Halide lighted tank, its kinda like holding a lighter up at a rock concert, you can see the light but it dont light the stage.
As for GARF using 40 watt lights, if you search through the disorganised site they have you'll see that they are fond of multiple triton and moonlight tubes on some of their frag tanks but I have heard reports from people who have been to their seminars that the SPS are raised under VHO or MH.
I myself and several others who have replied to this thread have spent money on NO lighting and have upgraded to better lighting
Low powered lighting does limit what one can keep and I feel its best to point that out to save animals and money in the long run.I agree with TD that planning a biotope or whatever then buying the equipment that will best support it is the cheapest and more successful in the long run

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I thought I was me, but we were wrong
email: geeflipr@internetcds.com

[Wrasse Man]

I understand Axel's predicament. I just upgraded to my PC's after a year. One animal that I would recomend right now would be sponges. They are colorful, don't like a lot of light and like just a bit of current. If you do upgrade, you could either put them under a ledge/cave, or trade them in. Just make sure they have water moving over them, otherwise algae will form and choke them, but with your low light, I wouldn't think it would be a problem.

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"Nothing good ever happens fast in a reef tank."

[odlaw]

My intent was not to discourage Axel from trying certain species nor was it to encourage low lighting. It' was based on my own experience. Many corals survive just fine with minimal light but growth and appearance can be severly limited as we all know. Many aquariusts upgrade after buying certain species and thats part of the hobby. Then again many hobbiests go to the extremes and perhaps over do it and many have to make do with what they have. As long as the owner is happy and thier animals thrive, whats the problem.
Sorry about the soap box but I thought this was headed to the old "your tank is too small" routine except with a light twist.
Personaly I would spend the money on new lights ( an investment)rather than risk loosing it on a dead coral or two (a loss).

[AxelG]

Thanks everybody for your input, this was exactly what I was looking for. I've been taking it slow so far and I think from what I've read it's now time to take it even slower and really plan where I want my tank to go.

I have checked out AHSupply.com before but will take another look, as for Home Depot I will search on that post by Bill-E. I also checked out the very unorganized GARF site. There's an LFS, The Inland Reef in Nashua, NH (about 1 hour from where I live) that I have read some good Web reviews on that gives a series of seminars, I believe one of them is on lighting, think I'll check it out.

Right now I am very happy with my shrooms and will do some research on polyps to see if they might work out in my tank. Thanks again.

[otis redding]

just read about corals that will work in low light if you are willing to do feedings .the author refers to this kind of aquarium as a deepwatwer reef aquaruim.he first suggests keeping certain non photosynthetic sponges,tube worms,and certain corals. hard corals (tubastrea aurea, astrudies calycularis,balanophyllia gemmifera.soft corals(dendronephtya aurea,dendronephtya divaricata,dendronephtya klunzingeri, scleronephthya. sorry if any spellings are incorrect. he goes onto name several fish that would be appropriate for this kind of tank. firefish ,blennies, dottybacks,mandarenfish .that's all i can remember. sorry for any incorrect spelling and hope this helps.