It’s quite impressive how many colors can be found in modern reef aquarium LED lights, and the numerous lighting control channels and the colors that ride on them can be quite overwhelming for the uninitiated. In the good old days we only had to consider a bright white, full spectrum lamp, an actinic blue lamp, and perhaps supplement with a trichromatic or pinkish bulb, however it’s a completely different story with light emitting diodes.
If we were dropped into this present future of reef aquarium lighting, we’d be just as lost as the next person. But having the benefit of learning the different colors and what they’re good for as they were introduced has certainly aided us in developing a deep degree of understanding and familiarity with the individual colors of the lighting spectrum.
As you might expect, each of these different LED colors have different uses and effects on both the photosynthesis and appearance of aquarium corals. Some of them like blue and royal blue are somewhat different in how they impact photosynthesis and the look of our corals while others like red and deep red only have minor differences in their effect.
Some reefers really enjoy understanding the purpose and specific uses of each segment of the visible light spectrum but we know that most of you just want to know how to program and schedule your lights. This video is really meant to mostly be an explainer of the different LED colors and is a precursor to a follow up video we’ll be sharing very soon about one of the most highly requested topics we’ve ever gotten, how to program reef aquarium LED lights.
