Live rock need strong light?
- Thread starter Doogle
- Start date
redneckgearhead
Active Member
For a fowlr tank you do not need a HO light. For the most part the stock lighting is fine.
florida reef
Member
You may need to consider another light choice for the Nem. Nems are hard to keep long term without the proper light intensity. T5's or metal halides would definitely suffice. You can actually get a pretty cheap TEK T5 supply, depending on how large your tank is.
redneckgearhead
Active Member
Your tank should have some age/stability on it before even considering a nem. At least a year!
clownfishrule
Member
na u can have a nem after about 6 months but u have to no what ur doing and cant skip wc
clownfishrule
Member
well you can tell like when you don't get any more spikes in ammonia nitrite nitrate (well if a fish dies if will spike nitrate that wll be fine but anyways) like you dont get any more alege blooms and stuff like that.
clownfishrule
Member
and a key sign is alot of growth of Coraline alege.
clownfishrule
Member
well i heard about that my lfs says stay away from sunlight but were it is now it get alittle bit around 3:00
Built347
Has been struck by the ban stick
I regards to when your tank is ready for something fragile like a nems.. there are a lot of contributing factors.. yes you need great lighting.. you tank does need to be extremely stable. And if you were starting from scratch with biofiltration then Yes a year is probably necessary... if you went out and bought all of your rock live essentially your tanks age is much older than it really is... I've witnessed new systems set up with live rock that had no cycle at all.. there was someone that ran into this recently on this forum.. as an example I started my reef tank with 50/50 live and dead rock... my tank did cycle.. fairly quickly IMO.. 3 months later I had 2 condi nems in there.. (Hardy nems). 2 months after that I put in another condi and a long tentacle.. that 4 healthy nems in my tank at 5 months and they are still kicking strong 5 months later... everyone's tanks will progress differently off the start depending on how you start... I agree with everything said previously just as much as I disagree.. these timelines are not set in stone and are highly dependant on your specific situation.. IMO. When your tank is stable you are ready..
Now.. in regards to keeping nems.. in preparing your tank for nems you are essentially setting your tank up for reef.. you will spend hundreds and in some cases thousands on lighting for a reef tank.. which would be wayyyy overkill for a fowlr tank.. I would seriously consider whether you really want nems.. if you must have them and you build your setup accordingly it will no longer be a fowlr.
....pingpong anyone?....
Now.. in regards to keeping nems.. in preparing your tank for nems you are essentially setting your tank up for reef.. you will spend hundreds and in some cases thousands on lighting for a reef tank.. which would be wayyyy overkill for a fowlr tank.. I would seriously consider whether you really want nems.. if you must have them and you build your setup accordingly it will no longer be a fowlr.
....pingpong anyone?....
redneckgearhead
Active Member
AND IMO It's not just about the tank, yes stable parameters and a stable tank are important and that takes time. It's also the age of the "reefer". It gives the reefer time to get in a routine with the tank, water change schedule, testing schedule and all the various other maintenance items, before adding a fragile animal to the mix.