Why isn't my hammer bright green like in the lfs?
 

http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2874/9...f967cdffda.jpg

You can see it brown in the bottom leftish area. In the fish store these are bright green. They are under LED lights in the lfs but a single T5 fixture at home. Could the bulb need replacing? Replaced it in January so not even 6 months old yet.

sigh, my tank is bare...I want more...expensive hobby.

Oh and PS - Should i scrape the back wall? I have high nitrates right now (40ppm) and I'm trying to find the culprit as water changes aren't bringing it down much.

Lighting is your issue, you have a single T5 bulb that's probably a lower K rating. You need actinic or blue type of lighting to bring out florescent greens.

Also more light tends to bring out more intense coloration.

You also have high nitrates - high nutrient levels will make corals be more brown (typically).

And yes, scrape the back.

How old is your tank?

This tank is about 8 months old. Heh, it looks younger than that...

When I scrape the wall I'm assuming I would scrape up and take it out of the tank?

I think a bit stronger lighting than a single T5 would help. What colour bulb are you using? Also, the browning is far more likely caused by your nitrates. No coral likes nitrates that high. Having some in a LPS tank is fine, but not anywhere near that high. Bi-weekly water changes and a skimmer should keep nitrates down.

Nitrates at 40ppm although high, would not likely be the cause of the browing of that LPS coral. I have seen a number of tanks with LPS corals with nitrates 40ppm and higher that don't have issues like that with LPS.

SPS is a different story....

Your single light bulb is the biggest problem here.

Are your rocks old? Like did they come from an older tank? Your nitrite problem could be coming off your rocks. I have had this problem in the past.

These rocks were fresh tonga rocks. Had about 2-3 months of cycling before adding any livestock. The levels were all good at that point.

i like how you have your rocks placed, it looks good :smile:

+1

So this is probably why I lost my acro sps. Stupid lfs knew i Was a newb,with a really young tank but they sold it to me anyways. Suppose i Could have done my research before buying it too...

What is a cheap solution for lighting that will help bring out my hammer? The budget for this tank is really low...

I would highly recommend you to change your lights to LED'S. Yes I understand they are very expensive but you can find some for around $200 on ebay or something. These will forsure bring the color out in your torch. LED'S are also good in the long run, less energy, less heat and some can give you at least years of light before changing them. Also keep up with your water changes! If your water is good your torch will go crazy. I bought mine 7 years ago as a 2 headed frag and now it has 21 heads.

Is there any cheap interm leds i can get away with for now until the purse strings can be opened more? Something from Here?

Going to try for a 10% water change every 3 days...hope that will bring down the levels

Sell the hammer and go with a fish only tank. Sorry for being so blunt but budget lighting and having corals never ends well.

Used T5 fixtures are usually pretty easy to find, like this one:
http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/sho...threadid=98752

Running four bulbs would make a huge difference over one and allow you to use a mix of spectrum including blue/actinic which is what you need.

For cheap LEDs the cheapest option is probably the D120
http://www.reefsupplycanada.com/d120...ight-16-light/
I assume one will cover your tank. Anything cheaper will likely not produce good results.

10% water changes won't be effective for nitrate reduction, better to do as close to 100% as you can.

You can also look into Sunblaster T5HO. For like $30 each light fixture (without the light), its possibly the cheapest option for decent lighting. MH goes for cheap too now-a-days (keep an eye on sell thread).

Sorry for being blunt too but it does end well as long as you get the "right" lighting ;)

Just find another couple T5 lights and add them, you'll be fine. Bulbs will need replacing every 6 to 8 months, likely.

The "right" equipment is rarely delivered on a budget, and just when you think it might have happened time tells you different.

So looks like having corals there isn't really a cheaping out, specially on lights. Found some more Taotronic stuff, wondering if these are the same. They look the same and not too expensive. I'm sorry for my ignorance but I want to try to grow corals but don't have the money to do the mega high end lighting stuff, trying to find the correct medium. :(

Thanks all for all the great info.

So with the water changes, should I be doing 30% biweekly to try to correct the nitrates?

I would do 10-15% once a week

It is expensive but not as expensive as some people tends to make it look like. You don't need mp40 or GHL mitra or BK skimmer to run a successful reef, you just have to make sure you get the best out of your budget :) Like many are suggesting, T5 would be an ideal option; you can't go wrong with T5 unless you put 6500k over the tank and see nice algae growth :D But yes, you will end up spending around $200 atleast for a proper lighting.

IF you are just sticking with softies/LPS I would buy these lights.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/310657779860...84.m1497.l2649

Not sure if the link is allowed (moderators feel free to remove)

$200, arrive to your house in 3 business days, dimmable and full spectrum.

It is difficult to run a reef on a budget but it is possible. But just like everyone else has been saying you must have decent lights to run a reef. soft corals would probably be best for you.

That's fine

Well that's great for regular maintenance if the goal is to reduce nitrates you should be looking at doing much larger changes. The tank doesn't look that big so changes upwards of 50% should be feasible. If you do 50% changes you need four of them within a short time frame to get you to 5ppm. Do the math for 10% and you'll see why it does nothing.

Perfect, I'll do a bunch of really big water changes to try to correct this broken tank. When you say a short amount of time what would that be? all within a week?

Looks like we'll have to live with the lighting we have for now and we'll save for an average cost set. Was thinking http://www.rapidled.com/ for a diy approach? I've seen a couple of these setups in youtube and they look good plus they seem to be great for the money. Anyone tried these?

Just a heads up about DIYs: they sometimes cost more than you would expect for smaller tanks. Bigger tanks benefits from DIY LEDs in terms of "savings" but smaller tanks usually don't unless you are a die-hard DIY fan; then its worth it :)

+1 My DIY was much more expensive then an off the shelf solution

Yeah within a week type of deal the sooner the better otherwise levels may climb back up between changes.

I agree with others about the DIY approach, no way it's cheaper than the D120.

As sphelps said, find a used 4-bulb T5 fixture in the classifieds on CanReef. I think the one he linked to is too short for your tank as yours appears to be 36". AquaticLife make reasonably priced T5 fixtures and used ones are quite economical.

For LPS, if you use mainly blue bulbs you can push 12 months on them ime. I use T5s over my Zoa/LPS tank and really like the results. I use 3 blue plus bulbs and 1 Coral Light bulb and replace one bulb every 3 months which is only $30 every 3 months - easy to handle.

For nitrate issues, big waterchanges won't fix the problem entirely. You need to locate the source...tap water? Overfeeding? Poor skimmer? Poor water circulation allowing detritus to settle? Etc... Check out the links in my signature for advice on tank maintenance (Detritus Wars & Hair Algae).

What about par30/38 light bulbs?

I may have been incorrect in saying T5, it's a dual bulb, would it be t5-ho?

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5526/9...42d935ffbb.jpg

I tested the tap water. No extra nitrates coming from there, a bit of ammonium (about 0.25ppm). I was over feeding, now I've cut that back even more. I might have a couple of spots where the water sits but I'm seeing flow everywhere and my CUC is quite good at getting rid of stuff. Just added 4 nassarius snaills to the mix too. I've also gone ahead and scraped that back wall. That was gross, the water looked like a slew...nice now though,

Titus99 gave me a bunch of info as well, my HOB filter I was neglecting and probably farming nitrates out of that. That's now being cleaned daily/every other day. I was over feeding lots, that's been cut back. So my nitrate levels have dropped to 20ppm after 2 30-40% water changes (45g tank, 1" sand, 35 lb live rock...not sure how much water is actually in this tank).

I've brought THESE up before but the community hasn't responded to it yet. Not sure if they are a good buy or not. I'm assuming not?

Thanks again to everyone who is helping me with this problem. The tank looks brighter and cleaner than ever before.

That's CFL (compact fluorescent light). T5HO is a whole different level of lighting ;)

Haha...uhhh, goooo LFS bad info again. Weee... I showed the a pic and that is what i was told. No wonder i couldn't find anything that,mentioned t5 on the box...

Haha, omg and the big giant COMPACT FLORESCENT didn't clue me in either...haha.

Good to see no3 coming down. Just keep up with husbandry and a good cuc and you be good to go.

Those bulbs were the Sh*t....





....15 years ago :)

Haha, they were free and ive got two more bulbs left. So you're saying my lights are classic.

Everything other than LEDs are classic ;) CFL is just classic-er :lol: