Light for low tech and fish?

[Aparker2005]

Hey everyone. I have a question regarding lighting for my 125 low tech tank.

Plants first off, are java Fern, anubius, and water wisteria. I may add some jungle Val also.

I want as low tech as possible. No c02 added, and basic ferts such as flourish and root tabs for the wisteria and jungle Val.

I don't want an algae outbreak like I had with my finnex planted plus.

The main fish are discus. The lights we have now are the stock t8 36"x2 fixtures. I added 2 6500k bulbs. The tank looks somewhat darker than my led was of course. The fish also don't pop as much, but that could be due to sand substrate instead of eco complete. The lights sit directly on the glass canopies and I don't necessarily like it.

Is there a 72" fixture, or 2 36" that will support these plants without an algae outbreak, and make the fish pop again? If what I have will support the plants just fine, I'll deal with the less pop on the fish color. Thanks!

 

[tomojsg]

cheapest method is buying shop lights. it's better to use t5 ho on low tec planted setups.

 

[convict360]

Ive had all of them grow, even with cheap clip on lights, or even sunlight from windows; throw in some nerite snails or a bristlenose and you'll have taken big steps to combating algae

 

[Aquanero]

Algae is dependent on several factures, however a little isn't necessarily a bad thing. I agree nerite snails do a great job keeping plants and glass/ornaments free of unwanted algae as do Otto's. Malaysian trumpet snails are also good at this plus keep the substrate turned and aerated. They (MTS) can become invasive if not kept under control, I use a group of 5 Botia kubotai they stay about 3" or so and love to eat the young MTS keeping the population under control. Siamese algae eaters are great at eating filamentatious type algae like black beard if it shows up. There are plenty of options as far as his goes.

On my low tech planted tanks I like double light fixtures. I use one 10k blub it's heavy in the blue spectrum but still has enough yellow & green to be visible and a floro max blub which is heavy in the red spectrum. Plants use blue light to stimulate bushy/leafy growth and red for tall/stem growth. Yellow & green isn't as important to them but it is generally the light spectrum we see in so that's for us more than the plants. This combination will also bring out the colors of the fish. There is more to this than what I briefly explained here but that is the general just of what goes on. Plants use more light than what is visible to us, so your double 36" fixtures with the correct spectrum bulbs will be fine and algae shouldn't be much of an issue. Hth.