therman's 12 year old SPS system...top down shot, starting to enjoy this tank again

[BranchingHammer]

Those were some of the most beautiful three posts I've ever seen. Do you ever frag your hoeksemai, Tim?

 

[Maximus]

Tim, what do you keep your nitrates and phosphates at?

 

[therman]

Those were some of the most beautiful three posts I've ever seen. Do you ever frag your hoeksemai, Tim?

Yep. They are both on my regular availability list now:
"Copps Turquoise hoeksemai" and "Deep Blue hoeksemai"

Ohio - Live Goods - A whole lot of SPS. BC, CC, JF, RMF, etc. + CSB anemones

Back by popular demand, here is a mostly complete list of what I have available now. Most are cut to order upon receipt of payment and will ship after ~2 weeks of healing, weather permitting. Overnight shipping via UPS Next Day Air for a $45 flat rate, delivered by 10:30am to most locations...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[therman]

Tim, what do you keep your nitrates and phosphates at?

In the main system where these colonies are: PO4 ~0.10-0.12ppm, NO3 undetectable
Backup system: PO4 0.04ppm, NO3 10-20ppm

I haven't gotten around to moving backup frags of these hoeksemai over yet, but I should do that. I have a different one called the JF Smurf or something like that doing fine in the backup too though.

 

[fishface NJ]

Love your tank

 

[SpSDrew]

Excited to get a frag of WWC King Fiji off you at LEAR. Will you have a table there?

 

[HudsonReefer2.0]

I highly recommend @therman. High quality and the man stands behind his product. If I had more room I’d add a few more. Mayb soon.

 

[drawman]

Another great coral that doesn't seem to be too common any more. Bright metallic green and red-orange base with yellow tips.

WWC King Fiji

That's awesome how does it look in person? This is the only one I've ever seen grown out not in a WWC tank with super actinics.

Here are a couple more that have evaded the camera up until now.

Acropora hoeksemai are awesome blue corals that I equate to long branching tenuis. I have two forms that have done really well for me the past couple of years. They seem to like plenty of PAR and flow and are thriving at a PAR of 400+ in my system

Copps Turquoise hoeksemai

and

Deep blue hoeksemai...honestly this one has looked bluer than Peng's HOTO in my system when I have had them side by side, but of course every system is different:

And here they are side by side for comparison.

That deep blue Hoek is gorgeous both are on my want list now!

 

[therman]

That's awesome how does it look in person? This is the only one I've ever seen grown out not in a WWC tank with super actinics.


That deep blue Hoek is gorgeous both are on my want list now!

King Fiji is interesting, very similar to CB Flaming Unicorn. I thought it was one of the "Bali Shortcake" types, but it is something else. The green and orange/red have a weird shimmering metallic quality to them. Kind of hard to put into words but it is different.

 

[BCSreef]

In the main system where these colonies are: PO4 ~0.10-0.12ppm, NO3 undetectable
Backup system: PO4 0.04ppm, NO3 10-20ppm

I haven't gotten around to moving backup frags of these hoeksemai over yet, but I should do that. I have a different one called the JF Smurf or something like that doing fine in the backup too though.

Could the name be JF Papa Smurf?l

In my system, it is as blue as the HOTO. Mabey even bluer depending on your definition of "blue".

 

[therman]

Could the name be JF Papa Smurf?l

In my system, it is as blue as the HOTO. Mabey even bluer depending on your definition of "blue".

Yep that is it. I'll put a piece of the deep blue hoeksemai next to it and see if they are at all different. I guess I could name my blue hoek something like "BLOOD OF THE DEEP" and then maybe it would be popular haha

 

[Fish Styx]

Absolutely beautiful

 

[therman]

Excited to get a frag of WWC King Fiji off you at LEAR. Will you have a table there?

Yep, I will have a "hobbyist table" with a smallish tank set up. Trying to get an assortment of nice looking frags cut to offer some selection. It is really hard to anticipate what people will want...

 

[Fish Styx]

Yep, I will have a "hobbyist table" with a smallish tank set up. Trying to get an assortment of nice looking frags cut to offer some selection. It is really hard to anticipate what people will want...

We want them all!!

 

[Hooz]

@therman it was nice to meet you and your wife at LEAR today, and thanks again for the great deal on the Jawdropper! It might be a "booger", but it's a bucket list "booger" for me!

 

[therman]

@therman it was nice to meet you and your wife at LEAR today, and thanks again for the great deal on the Jawdropper! It might be a "booger", but it's a bucket list "booger" for me!

Likewise! Always nice to meet people in person rather than just typing at them

 

[Vette67]

Tim, it was nice meeting you and your wife at LEAR last weekend. I got the Bahama Mama. So far, so good. It doesn’t seem to mind my halides. Now we’ll see if I can get it to grow quickly.

 

[therman]

Reefbreeders Settings!
​

I thought I had posted this info a while back but could not find it on a quick review of this thread, so here it is (again?)

Fixture height:

Most of my tanks are ~13" deep prop tanks for large scale Acropora propagation. Over these tanks my Reefbreeders Photon v2+ fixtures are mounted around 13" above the water. On average this equates to around 20"-21" from the corals themselves (+/- ~3" depending on the height of the corals under them).

This height will obviously vary quite a bit between systems with tanks of different depths. Ultimately I aim for PAR anywhere between 300-500 for most Acropora, with 350-400 being the sweet spot for 90% of the different varieties out there in the hobby.

Photoperiod:

This varies between tanks, but some of the tanks where the corals seem to grow the best have a photoperiod of all channels at their max settings for 7-8 hours, with a ramping period of 1 hour at either end. In some tanks there is a ramping period of just blue light, in others it is all channels. I dont think it really matters too much either way and is just whatever you want for aesthetics.

Some people might argue that corals are tropical, so they have a 12/12 day/night cycle. However because they are underwater, any hours where the sun is at a low angle in the sky results in much of the light reflecting off the surface of the water and a rather low intensity of sunlight actually reaching the corals and the effective period of photosynthesis necessary is much less than 12 hours. Corals also become photosaturated at a certain point, such that additional light is not actually benefitting them.

Channel Settings:

For all of my tanks running Reefbreeders, I have them set to something like this for the "max settings" referred to above:

Green 100%
Red 60-75%
White 70-75%
Cool Blue 100%
Royal Blue 100%
Violet 100%

Again the exact setting of white and red channels is pretty much a product of the fact that I set up these fixtures at varying times and couldn't remember exactly what all the others were set to. Tweaking the red and white channels is mostly a matter of personal preference.


I currently have 15 Reefbreeders Photon v2 fixtures running over my tanks, along with 3 DIY Cree LED fixtures I built before commercial LED fixtures were widely available (2008-2010). A few of the corals people might get from me are under the DIY fixtures but almost all Acropora are grown and healed under Reefbreeders.

I have only used Reefbreeders fixtures or DIY fixtures since about 2009, so I am no help when it comes to settings for Radions, Orpheks, Kessils, T5s, etc. etc. As a result, I really have no useful suggestions to share regarding how to set them up or how corals will respond to them. I'm sure there are plenty of other great lights out there, but Reefbreeders fit the bill for me and were an easy and economical transition to make coming from the large DIY array style fixtures I'd built myself in the past. I have to give major credit to my friend Adam at @Battlecorals for insisting I give Reefbreeders a try after he had great success with them. Also have to give major credit to Logan at Reefbreeders for absolutely awesome customer service whenever I ran into challenges with the lights.

I hope this info is helpful! Just let me know if there are any additional details you think I'm missing here and I will try to edit them in so all the info is in one place to refer back to.

 

[bibarassa]

Great 3d, thanks for your tips, can you tell me the depth of your tanks?

 

[BranchingHammer]

Reefbreeders Settings!
​

I thought I had posted this info a while back but could not find it on a quick review of this thread, so here it is (again?)

Fixture height:

Most of my tanks are ~13" deep prop tanks for large scale Acropora propagation. Over these tanks my Reefbreeders Photon v2+ fixtures are mounted around 13" above the water. On average this equates to around 20"-21" from the corals themselves (+/- ~3" depending on the height of the corals under them).

This height will obviously vary quite a bit between systems with tanks of different depths. Ultimately I aim for PAR anywhere between 300-500 for most Acropora, with 350-400 being the sweet spot for 90% of the different varieties out there in the hobby.

Photoperiod:

This varies between tanks, but some of the tanks where the corals seem to grow the best have a photoperiod of all channels at their max settings for 7-8 hours, with a ramping period of 1 hour at either end. In some tanks there is a ramping period of just blue light, in others it is all channels. I dont think it really matters too much either way and is just whatever you want for aesthetics.

Some people might argue that corals are tropical, so they have a 12/12 day/night cycle. However because they are underwater, any hours where the sun is at a low angle in the sky results in much of the light reflecting off the surface of the water and a rather low intensity of sunlight actually reaching the corals and the effective period of photosynthesis necessary is much less than 12 hours. Corals also become photosaturated at a certain point, such that additional light is not actually benefitting them.

Channel Settings:

For all of my tanks running Reefbreeders, I have them set to something like this for the "max settings" referred to above:

Green 100%
Red 60-75%
White 70-75%
Cool Blue 100%
Royal Blue 100%
Violet 100%

Again the exact setting of white and red channels is pretty much a product of the fact that I set up these fixtures at varying times and couldn't remember exactly what all the others were set to. Tweaking the red and white channels is mostly a matter of personal preference.


I currently have 15 Reefbreeders Photon v2 fixtures running over my tanks, along with 3 DIY Cree LED fixtures I built before commercial LED fixtures were widely available (2008-2010). A few of the corals people might get from me are under the DIY fixtures but almost all Acropora are grown and healed under Reefbreeders.

I have only used Reefbreeders fixtures or DIY fixtures since about 2009, so I am no help when it comes to settings for Radions, Orpheks, Kessils, T5s, etc. etc. As a result, I really have no useful suggestions to share regarding how to set them up or how corals will respond to them. I'm sure there are plenty of other great lights out there, but Reefbreeders fit the bill for me and were an easy and economical transition to make coming from the large DIY array style fixtures I'd built myself in the past. I have to give major credit to my friend Adam at @Battlecorals for insisting I give Reefbreeders a try after he had great success with them. Also have to give major credit to Logan at Reefbreeders for absolutely awesome customer service whenever I ran into challenges with the lights.

I hope this info is helpful! Just let me know if there are any additional details you think I'm missing here and I will try to edit them in so all the info is in one place to refer back to.

These are very similar to my settings, but I just run a bit less white (40% peak). Maybe I should start running my white a bit higher...

Regardless, these lights grow coral! Thanks for posting this write-up!