My pink corals are not pink

percula99 · 02/18/2020, 04:27 PM

All of my corals have beautiful color except for my pink birdsnest and pink pocillipora. Actually, my pink birdsnest is shocking pink while under ambient room light but as soon as I light my reef with LEDs it turns very pale pink, almost white. My pocillipora is brown with some pink tips. All other corals have beautiful color. My blues, greens, yellows, oranges are vibrant. I don’t really want to mess up my coral colors to make these two look good, but any ideas would be welcome.

My lighting is three Kessil A360-WE fixtures (90 watts each) and two Evergrow IT-5080 fixtures (230 watts each) Color ratio: (Hyper Red: 4 Osram (3W), Green: 4 Cree XPE (3W), Deep Blue: 16 Cree XTE (5W), Cool White: 20 Cree XTE (5W), Blue: 16 Cree XPE (3W), Indigo: 12 SemiLEDS (3W))

My lighting schedule is 14 hours. This may be long for some people but it works for me. The first four hours is a ramp up from 9am to 1pm. Full brightness is for 6 hours until 7pm and a four hour ramp down to 11pm.

At full brightness the set up is Red – 10, Green – 10, Royal Blue – 100, White – 40, Blue – 100, Indigo (UV) – 100

My parameters are:

Nitrate - 8
Phosphate - 0.03
Calcium - 455
Magnesium - 1440
Ph - 8.09
dKh - 8.45
Sp. Gravity - 1.026
Temp - 78.9F

These parameters are very consistent week to week.

Any thoughts or suggestions?

mcgyvr · 02/18/2020, 04:46 PM

Stop complaining

Or try adjusting things...Don't be ****ed when all other corals go downhill and those 2 perk up...

Misled · 02/18/2020, 06:30 PM

It's not that they aren't pink, the problem is you have a lot of blue in your lighting. You can up the whites, or lower the blues to get the look you want. Or like mc said, just leave it alone. If it's growing and everything else is fine, it's a pretty good trade-off.

percula99 · 02/18/2020, 07:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Misled

It's not that they aren't pink, the problem is you have a lot of blue in your lighting. You can up the whites, or lower the blues to get the look you want. Or like mc said, just leave it alone. If it's growing and everything else is fine, it's a pretty good trade-off.

My Evergrow lights have pre-sets on them for Sunny and Daylight which reduce the blues and UV to 30 and 50 respectively. The pink really comes out on those settings but the rest of the tank looks so drab it isn't worth using.

Big E · 02/19/2020, 04:39 AM

There are two issues.............you really aren't coloring any of your corals to full potential, that's why they don't look as vibrant when you run a whiter look because you run too much blue vs other colors.

Some colors look good with more blue because your eyes benefit visually from the look......that's why blue, green and orange look better..........there is more color reflection........think black light posters.

You basically have three options.

1. Live with what you have for lighting which is a crappy option because you're unhappy.

2. Upgrade with some T5-

Aquatic Life fixtures have become very popular for people as they look good and add what your LEDs don't offer.

You could also get a LET T5 kit and then make a floating canpoy for a clean look(least expensive option)

3. The most expensive option would be to buy new LEDs with more control and with a ratio of led diodes that will give you more of what your fixtures are missing. I would try to avoid this option as it isn't going to be that much of a performance upgrade and it's going to cost you a lot of $.

You may also still end up adding T5 as plenty of people do even with these expensive LED fixtures.

percula99 · 02/19/2020, 09:24 AM

It's not that I am unhappy with the coloration of all my corals, it's just the coloration of those two pink corals, as I mentioned. The reason I have so much blue is because of the Ecotech CoralLab AB+ settings. You can see them on the short video linked below. Recently however I have noticed that Ecotech has taken down these settings and I cannot find them anymore unless you find them in someone else's referenced video like this one.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c5U9kaZc7n8

I changed the setting slightly from 24 on the Red and Green settings to 10 because I get cyano outbreaks at 24, and I found 24 on the white too pale blue overall so I upped it to 40. I use the 100 on blues and UV from these recommendations.

Does anyone add amino acids or additives to increase color? Apparently Potassium will bring out Pink and Red.

five.five-six · 02/19/2020, 09:39 AM

I run a Giesmann spectra wit 3X 400W Radiums, 2X ATI blue plus and 2X euroquatics "blue pop"

Depending on which lamps I'm running, it's 3 different tanks.

There's a set of coral that look great under the halides, then another set that looks great under LED with some crossover and then under the T5 they mostly all look pretty good but not much is banging.

10 year old photos of my pink birdsnest and green pocillipora duking it out LOL

Big E · 02/20/2020, 02:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by percula99

It's not that I am unhappy with the coloration of all my corals, it's just the coloration of those two pink corals, as I mentioned. The reason I have so much blue is because of the Ecotech CoralLab AB+ settings. You can see them on the short video linked below. Recently however I have noticed that Ecotech has taken down these settings and I cannot find them anymore unless you find them in someone else's referenced video like this one.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c5U9kaZc7n8

I changed the setting slightly from 24 on the Red and Green settings to 10 because I get cyano outbreaks at 24, and I found 24 on the white too pale blue overall so I upped it to 40. I use the 100 on blues and UV from these recommendations.

Does anyone add amino acids or additives to increase color? Apparently Potassium will bring out Pink and Red.

Ammino acids will basically add nitrogen and is only going to help all corals if they are pastel or pale due to low nitrate levels.

The potassium additions to promote color are garbage and a myth. If you're running normal levels 390-400 it's fine.

I gave you my recommendations............it's an overall spectrum issue, that's how you fix things. If all your corals are peaking in growth and coloration they should all look good under a whiter or bluer look.

Heavy blue just makes things look better to our eyes and too much overwelms other spectrums that are needed to excite pigments.

percula99 · 02/20/2020, 02:34 PM

Would you guys mind posting your lighting settings for comparison?

02/18/2020, 04:27 PM	#1
percula99 Registered Member Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: Ottawa, Ontario, Canada Posts: 609	My pink corals are not pink All of my corals have beautiful color except for my pink birdsnest and pink pocillipora. Actually, my pink birdsnest is shocking pink while under ambient room light but as soon as I light my reef with LEDs it turns very pale pink, almost white. My pocillipora is brown with some pink tips. All other corals have beautiful color. My blues, greens, yellows, oranges are vibrant. I don’t really want to mess up my coral colors to make these two look good, but any ideas would be welcome. My lighting is three Kessil A360-WE fixtures (90 watts each) and two Evergrow IT-5080 fixtures (230 watts each) Color ratio: (Hyper Red: 4 Osram (3W), Green: 4 Cree XPE (3W), Deep Blue: 16 Cree XTE (5W), Cool White: 20 Cree XTE (5W), Blue: 16 Cree XPE (3W), Indigo: 12 SemiLEDS (3W)) My lighting schedule is 14 hours. This may be long for some people but it works for me. The first four hours is a ramp up from 9am to 1pm. Full brightness is for 6 hours until 7pm and a four hour ramp down to 11pm. At full brightness the set up is Red – 10, Green – 10, Royal Blue – 100, White – 40, Blue – 100, Indigo (UV) – 100 My parameters are: Nitrate - 8 Phosphate - 0.03 Calcium - 455 Magnesium - 1440 Ph - 8.09 dKh - 8.45 Sp. Gravity - 1.026 Temp - 78.9F These parameters are very consistent week to week. Any thoughts or suggestions? __________________ Hobby Experience: Marine tanks for thirty years. Current Tanks: 180 gallon reef. 270 lbs live rock. SPS, LPS and softies. 3 Kessil A360W-E pendants and 2 Evergrow IT-5080 fixtures.

02/18/2020, 04:46 PM	#2
mcgyvr Registered Member Join Date: Sep 2003 Location: North Carolina Posts: 20,050	Stop complaining Or try adjusting things...Don't be ****ed when all other corals go downhill and those 2 perk up... __________________ Who me?

02/18/2020, 06:30 PM	#3
Misled RC Mod Join Date: Oct 2006 Location: Pittsburgh, Pa Posts: 11,440 Blog Entries: 11	It's not that they aren't pink, the problem is you have a lot of blue in your lighting. You can up the whites, or lower the blues to get the look you want. Or like mc said, just leave it alone. If it's growing and everything else is fine, it's a pretty good trade-off. __________________ Jesse I'm not saying I'm Batman. I'm just saying nobody has ever seen me and Batman in a room together.

02/19/2020, 04:39 AM	#5
Big E Registered Member Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: South Euclid, OH Posts: 4,281	There are two issues.............you really aren't coloring any of your corals to full potential, that's why they don't look as vibrant when you run a whiter look because you run too much blue vs other colors. Some colors look good with more blue because your eyes benefit visually from the look......that's why blue, green and orange look better..........there is more color reflection........think black light posters. You basically have three options. 1. Live with what you have for lighting which is a crappy option because you're unhappy. 2. Upgrade with some T5- Aquatic Life fixtures have become very popular for people as they look good and add what your LEDs don't offer. You could also get a LET T5 kit and then make a floating canpoy for a clean look(least expensive option) 3. The most expensive option would be to buy new LEDs with more control and with a ratio of led diodes that will give you more of what your fixtures are missing. I would try to avoid this option as it isn't going to be that much of a performance upgrade and it's going to cost you a lot of $. You may also still end up adding T5 as plenty of people do even with these expensive LED fixtures. __________________ 80g Rimless Acropora System reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2197142&page=31 Ed Last edited by Big E; 02/19/2020 at 04:45 AM.

02/19/2020, 09:24 AM	#6
percula99 Registered Member Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: Ottawa, Ontario, Canada Posts: 609	It's not that I am unhappy with the coloration of all my corals, it's just the coloration of those two pink corals, as I mentioned. The reason I have so much blue is because of the Ecotech CoralLab AB+ settings. You can see them on the short video linked below. Recently however I have noticed that Ecotech has taken down these settings and I cannot find them anymore unless you find them in someone else's referenced video like this one. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c5U9kaZc7n8 I changed the setting slightly from 24 on the Red and Green settings to 10 because I get cyano outbreaks at 24, and I found 24 on the white too pale blue overall so I upped it to 40. I use the 100 on blues and UV from these recommendations. Does anyone add amino acids or additives to increase color? Apparently Potassium will bring out Pink and Red. __________________ Hobby Experience: Marine tanks for thirty years. Current Tanks: 180 gallon reef. 270 lbs live rock. SPS, LPS and softies. 3 Kessil A360W-E pendants and 2 Evergrow IT-5080 fixtures. Last edited by percula99; 02/19/2020 at 09:43 AM.

02/19/2020, 09:39 AM	#7
five.five-six Registered Member Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: Corona Posts: 7,827 Blog Entries: 6	I run a Giesmann spectra wit 3X 400W Radiums, 2X ATI blue plus and 2X euroquatics "blue pop" Depending on which lamps I'm running, it's 3 different tanks. There's a set of coral that look great under the halides, then another set that looks great under LED with some crossover and then under the T5 they mostly all look pretty good but not much is banging. 10 year old photos of my pink birdsnest and green pocillipora duking it out LOL __________________ Originally posted by yellowslayer13: "I hate that hole" Current Tank Info: SCMAS Member 225 peninsula euroreef RS180 Apex 400W X 3 20k radiums / Spectra mixed SPS

02/20/2020, 02:34 PM	#9
percula99 Registered Member Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: Ottawa, Ontario, Canada Posts: 609	Would you guys mind posting your lighting settings for comparison? __________________ Hobby Experience: Marine tanks for thirty years. Current Tanks: 180 gallon reef. 270 lbs live rock. SPS, LPS and softies. 3 Kessil A360W-E pendants and 2 Evergrow IT-5080 fixtures.