Pick my light bulb

sivic

sivic

rum's my friend
Aug 6, 2004
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Cincinnati Ohio
sivic.has-my.info
I bought a T5HO fixture and it came with 2 bulbs with it. one 54W HO T5 bulb 12000K and one 54W HO T5 bulb actinic blue. Im pretty sure the 12000k bulb should be alright for plant growth but the actinic blue wont help plants i believe? If you could recommend which bulb i should pick from this webpage i would greatly appricate it. I guess common sense would dictate to pick the planta bulb but was wondering if one would be better over the other.
 
What size tank are you trying to grow plants in? How deep is it? I"d pick the bulb with the most K myself (more output of light is almost always better, esepcially with deeper tanks). It also depends a bit on if you are going to use CO2 and what sort of plants you want to grow...

Emily
 
firefly said:
What size tank are you trying to grow plants in? How deep is it? I"d pick the bulb with the most K myself (more output of light is almost always better, esepcially with deeper tanks). It also depends a bit on if you are going to use CO2 and what sort of plants you want to grow...

Emily
Click to expand...

55gallon, 20" deep. No co2 for awhile. And im going to grow any plants that i can. Thats my one of my many questions to ask after i take care of the lighting. So far i just got done putting in eco complete. Now im redoing the lighting then ill worry about the plants.
 
With no CO2, too much light can cause massive algae, so I would stick with some lower light plants, and then not go as bright on the light. I'd also try to find fast growing plants, as those help outcompete the algae, though usually CO2 is what is needed for fast growing stuff.... I'm no expert by any means, so hopefully someone who knows more will jump in soon. And, now that you've answered my questoins, they should have more info to help you with! :).

Emily
 
Anything between 3000K and 10000K is OK for plants. It depends on your eye's preference. Plants don't care one way or the other. I have been able to grow plants with 6700K, 10000K and 50/50 CFs. Its the WPG that count.

Scott
 
high output T5s with a reflector are more than 2 times as effective as the same wattage normal ouput t8 or t12 bulbs are. the wpg guidelines are based on normal output flourescents so you have to figure that you have more light than the wattage suggests.

You can have a ballanced tank with no algae with high light or low, and both setups benefit from CO2, just at different rates. I would deffinately give plantbrain's site a look over. I am useing his Estimative Index and I can say I would be years figureing out how much is enough when trying to feed the plants. Useing that I have a tank with no algae from setup and I can think about aquascapeing instead of how to grow plants.
 
yeah, plantbrain/Tom Barr has enlightened quite a few here and on other boards on what plants need to grow well. Read through the posts he has made and you can learn alot about growing plants.
 
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