Wattage question

[VioletEmber]

K, I have a hood with two screw in fixtures. The hood says to not use anything over 20 watts. I want to replace the stock lights with something better for plant growth. It's a 10 g tank so if I got two 20 bulbs I would be considered "high light"? I don't want to get into CO2 yet but dose with flourish.

So what kind of light am I looking for? I went to home depot and got completely confused - the cfl bulbs all had "uses 13 watts, puts out 40 watts" on them...seems like people are always saying they found cheap cfl bulbs other places than aquatic shops but I haven't seen small enough bulbs in the right spectrum. I am so confused!

 

[Slade]

The limit is actual watts, so 13W is well below the electrical rating, and won't heat your water. CFL's with "daylight" rather than "cool white" have a higher temperature K, and are better for plants.

I'm not sure if 2 x 40W light is overkill in a 10 gallon, hopefully someone with more knowledge will chime in.

 

[VioletEmber]

So since it uses 13 watts it is ok to put in the fixture even though the output is equivalent to 40 etc. But, yes we still need to know whether that output of that much wattage in a cfl would just grow me a really nice algae farm.

 

[Cichlid Kid]

I have those cfl's on my one ten gal they r 13w daylite. Ive had java fern, anubias nana, and hygrophilia for awhile now and they're all doing well. The hygro is really growin like mad. I dose with flourish every week.

 

[aqua_chem]

2 10w or 13w bulbs in a 10g will give you more than enough light to grow basics plants. Two 20w bulbs might give you more than you would want without carbon supplementation. It also might run a bit hot for a 10g.