Need help on coral bleaching/lighting issue

Go back to 8h a day let the corals color back up. Then increase light 1h at a time and wait a week or two before the next increase. Personally I think anything more than a 10h light cycle for your day lights is a waist of energy and bulb life.

Bill

 

Back your lights off for sure.

I run mine 12 hours but the first 4 and the last four are not 100% (they ramp up and down).

So they only get 6 hours of intense light.

In your case I would consider the blue lights only the first two and last two hours, with blue and white the middle hours.

 

Wattage per gallon is still a bit of a myth... If there was a perfect measurement then we would all have awesome tanks and no lighting issues!

As far as the corals go. Leave the plate in there, they have a tendency to come back to life. If the mouth on the coral is gone then she is gone (for now) The meteor shower should pop right back up with a little TLC. Make sure your parameters are good and change if needed, cut the lights back and graduate by an hour per week until you have reached the time that you are looking for ( 12 hours is A LOT of sunlight. You may end up having longer term algae issues or PH tanks swings if you don't have a reverse photo period.)

 

Also your T5's on a 48" system should be 54 watt with HO's right...? with x4 at 75 gallons is only 2.88 watt per gallon. Which is no issue at all (esp compared to my 75 at nearly 10 watts a gallon. or my 40 at 15.2 watts a gallon)

I had a ton of great growth on a 4 T5 system and softies and LPS in my 75. What bulbs are you running?

 

With so many people moving to LEDs and potentially frying their corals I am surprised I don't see the more people point out that more lighting needs more flow. Now of course some LPS can't handle tons of flow and there is a limit to flow when it damages tissues, but there are some really good references that show over-illumination causes heat to be built up in the coral tissue that leads to bleaching. This can be circumvented by adding more flow. More intense light? Add flow. Not sure why I don't see this on more forums. There are more references out there, I couldn't find the one I really like, but here are a few:

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2006/9/aafeature2
http://pcp.oxfordjournals.org/content/45/2/251.long