Live Rock or New Lighting?

[thakr21]

OK, I want to purchase some more LR for SWF. However, most of the LR I have now in my tank had a decent amount of life on it. That is until my clean up crew got ahold of it. Now here's the thing. I only have two 30 watt coral life bulbs on my tank. Did the life on my rock not thrive and spread because my lighting isnt any good? Im thinking I should wait and buy my LR after I buy some better lights. What does everyone think? And if u think go with lights first what would be good to get? While trying to keep the price decently low for that of a MH or PC lighting. Any suggestions ?? Thanks for the help!

 

[irishstout]

If it were me I would upgrade the lighting before I bought more live rock. The size of the tank and more improtantly what you want to keep would dictate what type of lighting you could go with. I just think that you would be happier in the long run if you went with lighting over rock. But this is just my opinion of course.

 

[thakr21]

I have a 55 gal.. Im just thinkin that improved lighting may spark things to grow better on my rocks.. Like coralline and tings like that.. Any suggestions on lighting?

 

[striker]

The most important factors in coraline growth to my understanding are circulation, calcium and water quality. I'm not sure how much lighting factors in to all this. Lighting comes into play when you are housing corals and for appearence. When setting up my tank I did it the other way around. Lr and ls, inverts and fish, lighting and last corals.

 

[mlm]

How much are you looking to spend. That will give us a better idea of what you should get (in terms of lighting) for your tank.

 

[travis truman]

my suggestion is the new coralife 4x65 2 act and 2 white.........its 250$...........lots of growth on my live rock since I got it

 

[irishstout]

Corraline is like corals in the sense that some prefer lower light and some prefer higher light, so the big factor in its growth, as Striker said, is your water quality. As far as lighting suggestions goes, it really depends on what you want to keep. I started with two 110 VHO's on my 55 and upgaded to four because it was relatively inexpensive. You could start with two which would not be very expensive, shop around of course, and that will allow you to upgrade later if you want to either more VHO's or even metal halides. It would also be a good upgrade from where you are now. HTH

 

[majakarot]

i agree about getting VHO- it gives you alot of flexibility because you can run from 220watts to 440watts on the same ballast, this makes it cheap and easy to upgrade

 

[gatorcsm]

I bought a semi-generic 440 watt VHO retro-kit for $231 with lights. It has worked great and helped tremendously with growth on my live rock.