Time of Day Matter?

[Tie]

I am working my way up to 12 hours for the Actinics and 10 hours for the MH. My question.... Does it matter what time of day I do the 12 hour period.

I'm a late person. I work later hours 11AM to 7PM and have time to enjoy and work with my tank more in the evenings. So my question is... does it matter if my photo period is in line with the sun outside or not? My tank is in a moderately lit room. I could be well lit but we don't open the blinds till afternoon.

Ideally I would like to set my photo period to run from 11AM to 11PM or even like 10AM to 10PM would suffice. But I'm not sure how outside ambient light effect or come into play when it comes to establishing a good photo period.

I currently run it from 10AM to 9:00PM.

[patsfan1130]

I am working my way up to 12 hours for the Actinics and 10 hours for the MH. My question.... Does it matter what time of day I do the 12 hour period.

I'm a late person. I work later hours 11AM to 7PM and have time to enjoy and work with my tank more in the evenings. So my question is... does it matter if my photo period is in line with the sun outside or not? My tank is in a moderately lit room. I could be well lit but we don't open the blinds till afternoon.

Ideally I would like to set my photo period to run from 11AM to 11PM or even like 10AM to 10PM would suffice. But I'm not sure how outside ambient light effect or come into play when it comes to establishing a good photo period.

I currently run it from 10AM to 9:00PM.

Doesnt matter

[Tie]

Doesnt matter

Really? That's good news!

How about 12PM to 12AM?

[Reefland]

Really, it does not matter and you should set your overall photo period for times that you can enjoy.

Scott Z.

[Ninong]

Really? That's good news!

How about 12PM to 12AM?

It really doesn't matter at all if the tank is isolated and not subject to a lot of ambient room light. If the tank is in a room with a lot of light, natural or artificial, it would make sense to have the tank's lighting schedule somewhat sychronized with the room lighting. Many people who are away at work during the day prefer to have their tank's lighting schedule either 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. or 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. or thereabouts. This is fine as long as you don't have a big open window next to the tank with natural sunlight streaming in at 6 a.m. every morning. For a reeftank, you want to provide a minimum of 10 hours of darkness during each 24-hr cycle.