Led Lighting: Am I Missing Out On Uv?

[Jeremyan7]

I have noticed my Zoanthids don't look as good as they did in previous tanks / others tanks. I have a relatively cheap LED light (bright as heck) but it only has 10k white and Blue LEDs (and like 2 green / red) . But NO UV ones.

I note that Radeon and other similar ones have a dedicated UV LED...
Would that effect the short / long term color of my corals?

Thoughts?

 

[Fredk]

Yes you are. There are fluorescing proteins (Basically sunscreens) in the 350-400nm range (UV) and 400 to 450nm range (violet) that will make your zoas pop.

 

[harleymike]

When i was goofing around building my own led lights. I made one for a 10 gallon tank. Put 5 led uv lights on it. Which I think is a lot over such a small tank. That little tank grew corals like made. It always amazed me at how well it did.

 

[TORX]

Got UV? Ask @Salty Cracker about him adding a lot of UV LED and his visual opinion on it. I personally added UV to my RapidLED's after reading some of his old posts on UV and glad I did.

 

[Salty Cracker]

Yeah I added a bunch and initially it bleached the crap out of my sps, but in the long run it was needed. Doesn't add anything visually to the tank, but the coral needs it.

 

[Jeremyan7]

hmm. thank you!