Light bulb novice question

[JVillegas11]

Hello everybody.

So I've had my little 10 gallon since I was a child. Now that I'm getting my first apartment in college, I thought, why not add live plants? I'm looking to achieve a very green tank, but that being said I have no idea what kind of light I need. I've read that for a 10-gallon tank, fertilizer would suffice, so I'm not venturing into a CO2 system. However, I've run into a problem.

I didn't know that incandescent lights wouldn't work! haha

My first live plant acquisition was an anubia attached to a driftwood. Before my plant dies, what kind of light should I buy? My little light fixture takes bulbs as opposed to fluorescent light bars which I guess is what I need.

I had one of those spiral light bulbs laying around and was wondering if those would work?

It's an Energy Smart General Purpose 13 watt lightbulb, Softwhite 2700k (I've read 6000-10000 is recommended, is this ok?) and outputs 825 lumens.

I only have 1 at the moment and have unscrewed the incandescent waste of money on the other side haha


Thanks for the help, everyone!

 

[BBradbury]

Your Lighting Question

Hello J...

I can give you the lighting basics, then you can decide what needs to be done. Here goes:

Flourescent is preferable. You need lighting that best mimics natural daylight, that's 5500 K. I use 6500 K bulbs because they're recommended for growing aquatic plants and are very close to natural daylight.

If you have 1 to 2 watts of light per gallon of tank size, you'll be able to grow most aquatic plants.

Adding some type of plant fertilizer is very helpful. I prefer liquids, because to me, they're very easy.

If you're going to have success with plants, you need to follow a frequent water change schedule and dose your fertilizer.

If you have any questions. Please ask me or anyone on the forum.

B

 

[Flossie]

Walmart has florescent screw ins in the fish department for 5.00 vs PetSmarts 10.00. They are
Extremely bright. I did Half incandescent and half florescent ( for now )

my tanks are not planted just thought u might wanna check into those

 

[Dangora]

It really depends on what you want to grow in your tank. I have a 10 gallon with the hood and it holds two bulbs. I use two aqueon colormax bulbs which are mini compact fluorescent. 6500K is what the sun is rated at, so any bulb close to that is optimal for growth but anything between 5000-10000k should be sufficient. I believe those bulbs are around 6700K that I use. My bulbs are 10 watts each so i have 2 watts per gallon. I can do low light plants and some medium light plants that work well in low lighting.

Anubias will grow well in low to medium lighting.

Here is a quick chart from a book I have about aquarium lighting levels


Light Level ~ Lux ~ Watts per Gallon

Low ~ 100-500 ~ 1-2
Medium ~ 500-1000 ~ 2-2.5
Bright ~ 1000-1500 ~ 2.5-3
Very Bright ~ 1500+ ~ 3+