how many watts per gallon?generally...

[Iphantom]

I am looking into upgrading my nano-reef soon and I have been looking at a 46 gallon aga bowfront

but I am not sure on what a good idea for lighting is(I was going to do a 175w MH 10,000k pendent) but now I am not sure if I need that much I saw some nice coralife 36" striplights but I am not sure how many watts I will need I plan to keep :

shrooms

polyps

softs

- and MAYBE lps

so generally what whould be a good wattage for everything BUT lps?

generally what whould be a good wattage with everything INCLUDING the lps?

for 46 gallons

-thank you in advance

-Matt

[Xwhite]

Hmm 46 gallon tank. Well, there are quite a few people here who keep 175 - 250 watt MH pendants over their 20ish gallon reef aquariums so I don't think 1 175 watt bulb is too much. As a matter of fact, with a PC actinic or two, I think it would be perfect. AND you could eventually keep sps corals if your heart desired.

 

As with all things, it depends. If I were keeping anything bigger than a 20 gallong tank, I would probably use MH lighting. Preferably a pendant so I wouldn't heat the tank up much.

 

For reference, on my old 55 gallon tank, I used 2 175 watt 10,000K bulbs and 2 55 watt PC actinics. And I loved the lighting on that tank. Your tank is only 9 gallons less in volume. Unless it's some strange shape, one MH and some actinics should do nicely.

 

John

[Iphantom]

how is a 96 watt and the mh light? whould that be good enough lighting?

-Matt

[Xwhite]

If you had a 96 watt PC actinic with a 175 watt MH bulb over that tank, you would be living in a land where could you keep just about anything you wanted in the tank.

 

John

[technoshaman]

Just for reference I have a 46 gallon bowfront as my regualr reef. I have 4 x 36 " VHOs over for a total of about 400 watts - 2 blue tubes 2 white. If anything it's a little too much in some places I had to move a few corals down since the lighting is so intense. I have mostly LPS like euphyllias, trachyphillas, playtgyra in there along with a couple of sps frags. they are doing ok but my montipora digitata frags actually started bleaching out a few months back till I mived them midwawy in tank - I have a porites frag and a hydnophora frag which are both near top and doing ok.

 

Also the light is so intense all my mushrooms have migrated under rocks.

[MiKeE]

it really depends on what you plan to keep...

 

WPG is just a rule of thumb, but does not always apply.