Par Measurements Overrated? Should you really care?

[revhtree]

Do you ever feel like lighting par ratings are overrated? I'm not talking about a light manufacturer over promising here. I'm talking about us, as hobbyists, putting too much effort and value into the par levels over our beloved corals.

PAR in relation to aquariums is the amount of light that penetrates the water column and is available for corals to use in photosynthesis.

I'm not trying to stir controversy here but I feel like we spend so much effort getting that LED, or whatever light it is, at just the precise "spot" so the par reading is exactly where we want it. I remember back in the day we didn't measure that stuff. We purchased lights and hung them over the tank, and they worked! I had beautiful corals and I never knew what the PAR was at all. If the corals stretched we moved the light a little closer. If they retracted we moved the light a little further away. Or we moved the coral!

I may be off my rocker here today so either somebody put me back on it or agree with me. I'm also not knocking knowing what your PAR levels are as I have tracked mine as well.


Do you think that knowing the lighting PAR over your tank is overrated or not?

Do you know what your PAR levels are?


@ESH PAR levels on his reef

 

[Peach02]

Personally I think it’s important but not be all end all, I just think it makes it easier to plan coral placement in future, dial in lights especially LED’s and know if your getting enough light to keep the corals you want eg a aqua one mariglow led probably won’t grow sps. That being said plenty of successful tanks have been made without ever doing a par test

 

[ca1ore]

Do you ever feel like lighting par ratings are overrated?

For experienced reefers, measuring light levels is completely useless/pointless. It's trivially easy to eyeball. I suppose somebody new to the hobby might find it briefly useful, but even there it is marginal. I think I own (or have owned) every possible Apex module and the 'award' for the most useless is a tie between ORP and PAR.

 

[Ippyroy]

I use a Kessil light for now, and they say you don't need par for their light. I will be adding a second one soon though. I will be using T5s in the future when I upgrade and won't really worry about par then either since you can't tune T5s.

 

[BackToTheReef]

I went with other b/c it is important to me but only as a starting point.

So as a newbie trying to get his head around all things new to me in reefing (stuff has changed a lot in 15 years) I have read a lot about PAR and seen a lot obsess over it (I will represent that remark as I start up my tank).

For me I know the levels I am going to shoot for throughout my tank so I can support the types of coral I want to keep. I actually want to try and map the PAR in my tank, like the BRS guys do in testing, and overlay that info some how on a map of my aquascape once it's done. That way I know roughly how much light an area is getting when the tank starts up (it will change as stuff grows right?) and sort of where I can put stuff.

This is going to tie into my quarantine procedure because I am probably going to use some lumi lites or other bars over my quarantine and will be able to ramp lighting up to where I am going to place corals and pull them out of quarantine at the appropriate place. That way nothing needs to change in the display...consistency right?

But that is just the starting point. Setting myself up for the best possible start and then let the coral be my guide. If it is doing poorly I can adjust position accordingly in correlation to light/flow.

Sorry for being long winded (and take this with a grain of salt because I don't have a ml of saltwater running currently)

 

[andrewkw]

I would like to know but not enough to buy a par meter or even rent one (not really feasible where I am anyway). My corals are all growing and thriving and as mentioned its relatively easy for someone with experience to eyeball. Even if you're wrong the coral will tell you soon enough. While I do primarily use led's I don't play around with them so no concerns there. Maybe but not certainly if I was going to setup a giant display tank from scratch I would use one then, but honestly even then there are so many other things I'd end up buying first.

 

[Bleigh]

I think it’s important and have used a par meter, but have also moved rocks and changed light settings since the last time I’ve checked it. It is on the back of my mind that I need to recheck my pars.

 

[Midrats]

I'll take par over a bogey any day.

 

[ScottB]

I do feel likely it is initially helpful when setting up your lighting -- particularly with LEDs. A meter can help you determine light overlap, spread, coverage, hot spots and cold spots. I was surprised to learn how high I needed to hang my LEDs to solve for hot/cold spots in the upper part of my aquascape.

With T5s it is less instructive. Just turn 'em on and go about your day.

 

[swiss1939]

Relatively easy to find par charts for common lights through brs and others on here. Then it's just common sense interpretations of those charts to apply for your system if you can find the chart for your light.

This gets you close enough which is all you really need prior to observing the real world responses of your coral to the light.

 

[KrisReef]

Do you think that knowing the lighting PAR over your tank is overrated or not?
I think knowing PAR like shown in the picture in post 1 can be helpful for general placement ranges but lots of the coral that comes into the LFS from "aquaculture" does not indicate the par levels on the coral bags that were measured at the farm that the coral was grown under. Some vendors provide that info, otherwise its a swag event for placement.

Do you know what your PAR levels are?
I have used the handy PAR estimator provided by @Dana Riddle right here on R2R but I'm also burning 250w metal halides over an 18 inch depth tank and not trying to keep to many low light critters.

 

[Daniel@R2R]

Do you ever feel like lighting par ratings are overrated?

For experienced reefers, measuring light levels is completely useless/pointless. It's trivially easy to eyeball. I suppose somebody new to the hobby might find it briefly useful, but even there it is marginal. I think I own (or have owned) every possible Apex module and the 'award' for the most useless is a tie between ORP and PAR.

I wonder if the advent of LEDs has made PAR readings more important. I agree that with MH or T5 it's pretty easy to eyeball it, but IMHO LEDs are not so easy to do that with.

 

[Brew12]

With LED's I feel a PAR meter is extremely useful. And, the more color customizations you have with those lights, the more important it is. And not just PAR, but more importantly, PUR.

If you are going to copy someone else's lighting program you can get away without one. My lights have 8 color channels which I have customized to get the color blend I enjoy the most. For me, that makes knowing PUR very helpful.

 

[BlennyTime]

I think PAR meters are trying to bring too much of an exact science to what is ultimately a trial and error process. If you know the general PAR map of the lights (which are available for most online), you know generally where to put the corals, and can adjust from there.

 

[F i s h y]

I'm old school (kind of) MH VHO T5 all meant to be ran at 100 percent. So i run my LED at 100 percent. I move the coral in the tank based on what they need. I find with my kessil A360WE's that the light emitted at 100 percent is pleasing to the eye and i have good growth in both my coral and anemones.

 

[ca1ore]

I wonder if the advent of LEDs has made PAR readings more important. I agree that with MH or T5 it's pretty easy to eyeball it, but IMHO LEDs are not so easy to do that with.

I guess I don't really see why. I bought the apex PMK for my frag tank to support a now aborted LED versus MH comparison, but have never used it in the main display. 100% LED now, but I still just eyeball it. If people find measuring PAR useful then have at it. I try to avoid too much measurement-itis.

 

[The_Skrimp]

I wish I knew because it would go a long way in helping me figure out where to place my coral. I’d also love to know if I should go brighter on my lights. Unfortunately a par meter is just way too expensive even just to rent one. I generally place my corals where I think they’ll be healthiest and if I see them open up and looking good I leave them and if not I’ll try a few different spots around the tank out till they look happy.

 

[LRT]

I went from Chinese black box to Reef Breeders Vr2+. Too entirely different monsters and light output. Its a good thing I did use the club rental meter as setting the Vr2+ up by "Eye" on what i thought where close setting and par output where totally not even close and would have burned most of my corals up.

That being said yes id highly reccomend using Par meter to get lights dialed in.
Not sure why we wouldn't want to get our lights fine tuned to allow our corals best possible overall health and maximum growth?

Its funny what happened after I got my lights dialed. Everything starting coloring up and growing rapidly.
Highly reccomend.

 

[Marc2952]

I use a Kessil light for now, and they say you don't need par for their light. I will be adding a second one soon though. I will be using T5s in the future when I upgrade and won't really worry about par then either since you can't tune T5s.

Dont believe that i have bleached corals with kessils, i did have 4 a360x on a 4ft tank though...

 

[trmiv]

I wouldn’t say overrated but the lack of any consensus of what the par levels are for certain corals leads to a lot of confusion. You can search for a particular LPS and have people say they keep it in 300+ par “right near my sps!” And then someone else says it frys at anything above 100 par.

There is also a lot of confusion about what par levels constitute “high”, “medium”, and “low” light. So when a site tells you to keep something in medium light, what par level does that translate to? Seems to vary by who’s opinion you ask.

That said I do have a Seneye to check par but it’s mainly to check where a coral is now vs say where I want to move it to and determine if I need to acclimate it or just move it. It’s also useful to know where the hotspots are in the tank because you can easily have a spot that’s 200 par and 4” away at the same level have 120 par.