What about lighting the larval tank?

[Kathy55g]

How many watts and how far from the surface do you have your lights? I am still trying to figure this out.

I lost 78 clownfish larvae on day 1. Can't figure out if it was the lights or something else. Less light for them today. Still have a lot of larvae left, but it is puzzling why they died.

Anyway it is about time for me to nail down the lighting issue. What do you all do?

Thanks,
Kathy

[jnowell]

Well Kathy, I know you could hardly wait for my advice ;) My current hatch, which has been by far the most successful went like this.

Hatch, and removed to tank with rotifers, phyto, and ambient room lighting only. Lights out soon after I removed all of the babies (about 1.5 hours after the main hatch took place. Next day, more rotifers, and again only ambient room lighting, there is a lot of ambient light because my phyto cultures, and two other tanks are lit up near by.

Day 2, one 15w power compact (the little 50/50 ones that fit in mogul sockets like regular incandescent aquarium lamps). I always make sure I screw them in so that the actinic side is down. The light is mounted in a cheapo plastic hood, turned sideways on the tank. I can then slide it back and forth to give the ammount of light they like.

These guys always stay at the top, if they don't like the light, they go to one of the darker ends of the tank (the light straddles right across the middle of the tank lengthwise. About 40% swim right under the bulb, the other 60% are on one side or the other.

There's one take on the subject, as always, my method is cheap, and not pretty, but it does seem to be working!

Sorry to hear about the die-off, I hate that!

[ediaz]

80 watts 24" from the surface...

[jacob30]

Ambient light first 3 days or so. The first day I even put a thin bar towel over the tank. Day 3-4 I start a small clip on light pointed at the wall right above the tank. About day 5 they have the light right over the tank.

[jnowell]

Kathy, I measured too, my 15 watt light is 8" from the water surface at larval water levels. They don't mind it much on the evening of day 2, but run and hide on day one. As usual though, Ed probably has it right!

[parshmar]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6573927#post6573927 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by ediaz
80 watts 24" from the surface...

80 watts of what kind of light and over what size of tank?

[ediaz]

flourescent, 2 - 48", 40 w tubes, over 54 gallon vat.

Ed

[Kathy55g]

In other words, a shop light. Thanks Ed! I wanted to use a shop light, but not sure if it was enough/too much.

[parshmar]

Shop lights are dirt cheap:)

thanks!!!

[FMarini]

ditto- what Ed says...
Ambient light for a few days followed by nbothing special. A shop light and 2 F40Dx 6500K bulbs (home dept baby) is more than sufficient

[BlackOnyx]

you should have no light for the first 3 days I think it is. Then slowly open up the top and then use a 10-20w light. Their instincts tell them to swim to a certain light level. If you have to much they're swimming into the bottom glass trying to get deeper.