lights or no lights
 

Hello

I'm new on here and the hobby, looking to have a couple of questions answered. I started my tank on the weekend, it's a 90g reef with a 38g sump. I was wondering if the lights in the tank and sump need to be on during the cycling period, if so, for how many hours a day?

Thank you

No is not nessasary but it will help you grow coraline algae and help any other photosynthetic hitchhikers that might be on your rock. the light will not affect the bacteria growth for cycling your tank however.

thank you. How long should I leave the lights on for?

+1 , whole cycling just a few hours is Good I currently have my lights gong for 4hrs a day untill my cycle is done then I'll bump it to 8 and slowly to twelve:):)

thank you, that helps a lot:biggrin:

Personally, I leave lights off during cycling. I also cycle without sand. The only thing that is photosynthetic that you want in your tank at the cycling period is coralline algae. Coralline will bleach with no light, but it will come back in a few months. I think it's much more important to keep the tank dim (or even dark) during cycling since there will be an abundance of nutrients in the water column; add light to that and you get an algae bloom. If you're good at cycling, the only algae you will see in your tank will be diatoms and they will cycle out on their own. In fact, once the diatoms leave you should never see any other algae other than coralline in your tank, ever. Some people think hair algae is part of cycling, but that is only if you make mistakes (like adding light when there is still nitrate and phosphate in the water column). Hair algae should not be expected. Of course, we aren't perfect so we battle things like cyano, hair algae, and bubble algae throughout the tank's life. Argh! :lol:

thank you. I also found what you have written about cycling the tank and it makes a lot of sense to me. I will leave the light off. :biggrin:

Just read your post on lights off during cycling. Is it too late for us too keep lights out now? We are about a week in, and just starting to see the brown algae that we have been told is " normal, or expected" I should mention that one of our pieces of live rock has five very small mushrooms on it, will keeping lights off hurt them?

I always keep the lights on the bare min while cycling to reduce algae but keep anything photosynthetic like coraline alive.

You could reduce your daily photo period. What's it currently at?