Suitable lighting

Ladyblue22018 · Posted: Fri Mar 16, 2007 12:39 pm Post subject: Suitable lighting

I'm thinking of buying a new light for my FLuval Duo 800. It takes 2 x 20W 24" lights. I'm currently using aqua-glo and sun-glo but I've had somebody recommend to me that I use Plant-gro as it has pinker light which the plants prefer.

I;d like to buy one of the Plant-gro lights to replace the sun-glo but what I'd like to know is whether you guys think this would be adequate lighting for healthy growth of a 55 plant collection that I mentioned in my other post.

My tank is about 45cm deep and the Rotala Macandra I have is looking straggly and untidy but then the collection was only planted little over a month ago.

I don't add CO2 but I do of course use a liquid fertiliser and sera plant tablets and alot of the other plants are doing really well though thinning inbetween leaf growth (which suggests to me that I need to prune more frequently to get bushier growth). The plants I have are:

Red Ivy
Bacopa Monnieri
Red Water Rose
Ech Tenellus
Hygro Polysperma
Vallis Torta
Elodea Densa
Hair Grass
Red Ludwigia
Red Ambulia
Rotala Macrandra

Any ideas??

matt · Moderator

In reverse order...

Thinning inbetween leaf growth - I'm taking that to mean that the stems between the each leaf is quite long? If this is the case, then it's simply the case that the plant is growing according to the light level. It's putting all it's energy in to stem growth to reach the light. Increase light levels should see bushier plant growth.

You could add a third tube, however, if you go above 2 watts per US Gallon, then you should start adding CO2. Taking that thought a bit further... Light determines the speed of growth which, in turn, determines the nutrient uptake.

Take a visit over to Tropica's website and look up each of the plants that you're growing. Pay particular attention to the light requirements. I could be that you need to select plants that grow in lower light levels.

Hope that helps.
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