| Update V, November 14, '97 11.00 PM On November 8, 9 and 10, 1997 we conducted a survey of the temperatures at which hobbyists keep their reef aquariums. The request for input was sent to all subscribers of our reefkeeping list (reefkeeping@athiel.com) plus a number of other hobbyists on email lists I own. A total of 776 messages were sent out in several batches. Replies were received over a 3 day period and computed. As you can see from the numbers in the table below, the response rate was quite high. 241 responses were received, which is quite high. Some hobbyists indicated ranges rather than exact numbers. These results were computed as 1 entry for each of the temperatures in that range, as at some point or another their reef was at each of those temperatures. Below are the results as of Nov 14, 97 at 23:00. You will immediately note from the results that the great majority of hobbyists keep their tanks in the 78 to 80 degree F. range. 79 and 80 degrees are the median temperatures with 79 outweighing the others. It is also interesting to note that as I received more data the % of hobbyists keeping their tanks at 80 degrees has gone up compared to what it was before. In fact the 80 degree number has now surpassed the 78 one. More answers are expected so I will further update this and probably graph based on a document sent to me by Craig O. Fogus It is noteworthy to mention that summer temperatures for some tend to be from one to two degrees higher than winter temperatures. Only a few hobbyists indicated the summer and winter difference though, so this should not be taken as a general rule. A few hobbyists indicated that they run chillers. Since that was not part of the question though, it is not really relevant. All we were interested in was the temperature itself, not how it was achieved. |
| 73 | 74 | 75 | 76 | 77 | 78 | 79 | 80 | 81 | 82 | 83 | 84 | 85 | 86 |
| 0 | 2 | 7 | 25 | 24 | 47 | 58 | 50 | 9 | 10 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 |
| This is by no means a scientific approach to determining reef tank temperatures. The results are very interesting though as the responses came from a group of dedicated hobbyists, many of whom have kept reef aquariums for some time. I suspect that a larger scale test would yield the same kind of results. What is interesting also is the number of replies that I received to the request sent out via email. 229 replies is very high indeed. What has transpired now that it appears that most answers have been received is that 79 and 80 degrees are definitely the most prevalent temperatures at which reef aquariums are being kept. November 14, 1997, Update V |