Frogspawn and duncan corals: causes of bleaching

[finley9]

So I've got a situation with my frog spawn - the color's still looking good, but my phone's camera does tend to make things a bit brighter than they actually are. Thing is, my frog spawn's all spread out, not in a tight ball like I'd expect. And my cousin's convinced my Duncan are losing their color.

I'm feeding my Duncan whole krill three times a week, and my sis or brine shrimp twice a week. I've got LED lighting in a 20-gal tall tank. You can see my Duncan eating in this pic.

No flow and I've moved the lights out of the way.

[felinxo]

What type of LED lighting do you have, is it like a specific brand or just a general LED setup, my cousin thinks the lighting might be affecting the color of your Duncan?

[finley9]

It's 97 leds at .06watt, 14,000k.

[rustyfox9]

Doesn't look bleached to me in that close-up, Duncans can have a pretty wide range of colors, from tan and gray to greens and teals - mine have newer heads that are a uniform gray-green, while the older heads are more of a blue-green. What's the tank depth and how high are those lights from the water surface? I did some quick math and it looks like you're running with around 5-6 watts of lighting power (97 LEDs x 0.06 watts), seems pretty low to me.

[finley9]

I'll get a full tank pic so you can see the setup.

Are these new heads coming in on my frog spawn or is that just me?

[finley9]

Doesn't look bleached to me in that close-up, Duncans can have a pretty wide range of colors, from tan and gray to greens and teals - mine have newer heads that are a uniform gray-green, while the older heads are more of a blue-green. What's the tank depth and how high are those lights from the water surface? I did some quick math and it looks like you're running with around 5-6 watts of lighting power (97 LEDs x 0.06 watts), seems pretty low to me.

I'm looking for some advice on lighting for my 20-gal tall tank. I came across this rule that says under 24 inches high, you only need 0.8 watts per gallon. That would put me at 16 watts. I'm not sure if that's enough though. I've also read that 14k is best for coral growth, which is what I'm going for. Does anyone have experience with this? What's the ideal setup for a tank my size?

[rustyfox9]

I've heard the watts per gallon rule is outdated with modern lighting, but I recall reading that for LEDs, a decent rule of thumb is 1-1.5 watts per gallon for low to moderate light corals.

[finsup]

Your frogspawn looks like it's doing great, nice and plump. If you haven't fed it in a bit, it's probably just looking for some grub. The way it's puffed up isn't a concern as long as your flow isn't strong enough to cause damage. And yeah, those are definitely new heads coming in - they grow pretty slowly, so the existing ones will probably split and branch out a bunch before the new ones catch up.

[finley9]

Should I just let them drop the sprouts or would I be better off fragging them once they get a bit more developed, I don't wanna risk losing them