Is there any reason why I could not just use blue lights all the time in my tanks? I'm thinking in the ocean most coral and fish are at least 20 feet below the surface so the light they get is blue and not too bright anyway so why do we use white light in our tanks? I am mostly curious because I find my 16" deep tank is too bright- my bta , sun coral , open brain coral etc all seem to thrive when I put the t8 blue actinic bulb in and shrink when my t8 daylight bulb is in. The daylight says 10,000 k the blue one doesn't say what it is except that its for saltwater aquariums. Anyways I'm just wondering if we really need white daylight bulbs or can I just use the blue?
Blue actinic lights
- Thread starter halobaby
- Start date
Doogle
Well-Known Member
What watt/length t-8 bulbs are you using and what are the dimensions of your tank?
You won't be able to keep high light corals with t-8 and I really suggest you look into another lighting source unless you just want mushrooms and low light corals.
If you upgraded to t5HO you can use ATI BLUE PLUS bulbs and be fine but I wouldn't use t-8 actinic because they suck.
You won't be able to keep high light corals with t-8 and I really suggest you look into another lighting source unless you just want mushrooms and low light corals.
If you upgraded to t5HO you can use ATI BLUE PLUS bulbs and be fine but I wouldn't use t-8 actinic because they suck.
I have a 29 gal it's 30" long, 18" and 18". That's too bad as my bta keeps moving all over the tank under the live rock, and I can't get my sun coral to open at all 
. The bulb I am using is a 24" 17 watt blue actinic same as the daylight one but the daylight says 10000k Maybe the daylight bulb is too much? Idk. Our lights are on for 14 hours a day. The 29 gal tank has no algae and barely any copopods, my 65 gal has tones of algae and lots of copopods. The lights on 65 gal are 2 10000k t5 bulbs, 30" long one is white and one is blue. My corals are growing but not as fast as I had thought they would. I also recently put a stick on submersible light in the big tank it is 17" long and led and it has both blue and white lights. In the big tank I also have a seabea anemone and it hasn't moved at all. I just want my corals to grow and eat and be healthy and happy and was hoping that the blue light would be ok for the one tank but if it needs white daylight then that's what I'll give it. Thanks again for the answers/ opinions guys
. The bulb I am using is a 24" 17 watt blue actinic same as the daylight one but the daylight says 10000k Maybe the daylight bulb is too much? Idk. Our lights are on for 14 hours a day. The 29 gal tank has no algae and barely any copopods, my 65 gal has tones of algae and lots of copopods. The lights on 65 gal are 2 10000k t5 bulbs, 30" long one is white and one is blue. My corals are growing but not as fast as I had thought they would. I also recently put a stick on submersible light in the big tank it is 17" long and led and it has both blue and white lights. In the big tank I also have a seabea anemone and it hasn't moved at all. I just want my corals to grow and eat and be healthy and happy and was hoping that the blue light would be ok for the one tank but if it needs white daylight then that's what I'll give it. Thanks again for the answers/ opinions guys
Doogle
Well-Known Member
My 29g (30x12x18) when I started had a 24" t-8 pink bulb and 2 coralife 14w t5 Normal Output bulbs.
Then I switched to a fishneedit 4x24w t5 High Output fixture with the stock bulbs.
Then I switched to a 4x24w ATI SUNPOWER with 2 ATI blue plus, 1 ge6500 & 1 Fiji purple bulbs
Then I tried out a 150w Phoenix 14k metal halide
Then went back to the Sunpower with 2 blue plus, 1 Fiji purple & 1 ATI actinic
What it still pretty much looks like with the Sunpower, with a DSLR camera
Then I switched to a fishneedit 4x24w t5 High Output fixture with the stock bulbs.
Then I switched to a 4x24w ATI SUNPOWER with 2 ATI blue plus, 1 ge6500 & 1 Fiji purple bulbs
Then I tried out a 150w Phoenix 14k metal halide
Then went back to the Sunpower with 2 blue plus, 1 Fiji purple & 1 ATI actinic
What it still pretty much looks like with the Sunpower, with a DSLR camera