5000 K

The friendliest place on the web for anyone with an interest in aquariums or fish keeping!
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.

mrsmarsig

Aquarium Advice Apprentice
Joined
Oct 3, 2005
Messages
20
Location
MA
I've got a 5000K lightbulb - how good is this color for my plants?
 
It's a great color for plants. It should appear as a pretty true white. I've read that anywhere from 5000 - 10000K is a good Kelvin range for plants. I prefer the 5000-6700K range myself.
 
The 5000K end of the 5000-10000K spectrum is more on the yellow side (from what I hear although, being color-blind, I can only go on what people tell me) and the 10000K is more of a whitish-blue hue. Anything in this range will work wonderfully for growing plants :)
 
it it's a T12 48" light....head down to your hardware store, and buy a GE 6500. Slightly better for the plants, but IMO looks a lot better as it's much less yellow and more whiteish blue light.

The GE 6500K 48" 40watt, is about 10 bucks for 2 of them at Wal-Mart and Lowes, if you have a smaller light size it's still worth a look. I've seen 18 and other sizes for the 6500K lights there.

That's my 2 cents at lest.
 
5000K is gonna look yellow compared to a 10,000K, and even to a 6700k it'll look a bit more yellow.
But a 3000K looks more yellow still as compared even to a 5000K.

But kelvin temp means squat for plant growth...its all about the spectral output, which kelvin doesn't measure.

5000K will grow plants just fine.
 
Alright...after doing a little reading, I see that Kelvin temp with flourencent bulbs doesn't tell you much except what color they'll look. It doesn't tell you if the lightbulb is giving off the wavelength of light which plants need and how intense the light at that wavelength is.

Am I on the right track?

But here's another question - since most lightbulbs only tell you watts and Kelvin, how do you know which lightbulb is best?
 
Back
Top Bottom