New Planted tank advice needed:)

  • We are currently upgrading MFK. thanks! -neo
S

Sarah88

Fire Eel
MFK Member
Sep 27, 2009
3,919
7
68
Wilmington, NC
hey i was wondering if you guys could give me advice on what bulbs to use and also give me some plant suggestions, i have a 20g Long that im planning to plant, i just have the regular fluorescent hood that you buy from petco on it right now and it takes 24in bulbs so what kind of bulbs would you suggest that could go in this fixture (says it can only use 20w) would something like these work?
http://www.thatpetplace.com/pet/group/10883/product.web

http://www.thatpetplace.com/pet/group/10880/product.web

also what kinds of plants could i keep under these lights im hoping to be able to keep some kind of red plant as well, any advice would be GREATLY appreciated
 
I think that you should go for the Second one, the Coralife 10,000K bulb. But Maybe someone with more experiance with plants could Chime in.
 
yeah i mean those were just ideas if anyone has other suggestions please tell me, and thanks tropicalfishking that would give me more lumens with same wattage bulb but dont know if that spectrum is needed for freshwater as i only know about 10000K being used for corals...
 
My LFS recommended that I eather get 4 6,500K bulbs or 2 10,000k bulbs. So I think that spectrum is Ok for plants, as well for corals. but you should get some more Oppinions other than mine, just to be sure.
 
ok kewl thanks for the advice yeah i guy i know reccomended this garden place that has really cheap lights so i may go ahead and go the T5HO route and be safe to keep whatever i want :)
 
I think that for longest tube life and Least amount of electricity consumption you should use T5HO bulbs with T5HO fixtures. But you should get some others advice other than mine.
 
Okay, you're on the right track with the color spectrum. Plants prefer a color temperature between 5500 and 10000k. The two most commonly used bulb spectrums for planted tanks tend to be 6700k and 10000k. With the hood you currently have, I would recommend one 20w 6700k bulb and one 20w 10000k bulb. This would give you a total of 40 watts of light over a 20 gallon long tank. Since the height of the tank is relatively low, most of the light would reach the bottom of the tank. Therefore, you would be getting roughly 2 watts per gallon of light in your tank.

With this amount of light, you would be able to grow most aquarium plants, with greater ease growing low to mid-level light plants. But, you would not have a sufficient amount of light for higher light demanding plants.

SO, regarding trying to figure out what you would like to do, ask yourself if you have any desire to grow high light plants? Just as a side note, high-light plants are much more work, as they are usually more sensitive to aquarium conditions. If not, then you should stick with the fixture you have, but invest in the new bulbs for it.

I am by no means the aquarium light expert, but I hope I have shed some LIGHT (haha, okay had to pun a bit) on the subject for you. If it were up to me, I would just get the bulbs like I've said above and I think you'll be more than content with that setup. Plus, you avoid spending the 100-200 bucs on a t5 light fixture.
 
yeah those bulbs would work but my fixture only holds one bulb which is where the problem comes in lol but guys i know told me about garden place that has cheap T5 fixtures as the ones he said the ones on his tank were only like 50 a piece so that is definitely doable, not sure about what plants i want to keep yet which is why i think i will just play it safe and get the T5s that way i wont really have to worry about my lighting not being enough and will just have to worry about ferts LOL thanks for the advice and love your ram in your avatar im thinking of getting a pair to put in my tank once the festae fry i have grow out :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
MonsterFishKeepers.com
Top Bottom