Will this light work for growing plants?

[Justme68]

Hi again everyone! I now I'm probably driving you all crazy but would this light work for a planted tank. I'll post the link if you don't mind taking a look http://www.fishneedit.com/30quot-2bulbs-fixtu302.html

 

[fort384]

What size tank? What are you planning to grow? Are you injecting CO2? Adding fertilizer?

 

[Justme68]

Hello Fort. Its a 29 gallon that I'm going to start cycling hopefully this weekend. I would like to have low to maybe medium light plants. I won't have co2 but i can dose ferts. I'd like to keep it simple as I'm just starting into the hobby. Thank you

 

[BHead707]

in short, yes they will grow plants those are pretty nice lights i have the 24'' fixture and i like it

 

[Justme68]

Yes!!! Its asking for a bulb choice : all blue actinic, 1white & 1blue or all white and it also asks for the color temp of the white bulbs: 10000k or 20000k. Thanks B, as you can probably tell I know nothing about lights and I really don't understand all the spectrum and stuff about it....

 

[Justme68]

Also, will it just grow low light plants or some medium light plants also? Sorry for so many questions

 

[BHead707]

Yes!!! Its asking for a bulb choice : all blue actinic, 1white & 1blue or all white and it also asks for the color temp of the white bulbs: 10000k or 20000k. Thanks B, as you can probably tell I know nothing about lights and I really don't understand all the spectrum and stuff about it....

i don't know much either but you wont want the blue bulbs if your growing plants. they wouldn't help much

 

[zach_1_6]

Yes!!! Its asking for a bulb choice : all blue actinic, 1white & 1blue or all white and it also asks for the color temp of the white bulbs: 10000k or 20000k. Thanks B, as you can probably tell I know nothing about lights and I really don't understand all the spectrum and stuff about it....

I would go for the 2 all white bulbs 10 000k

 

[Justme68]

Thank you guys so much! I just don't want to spend the money and have it not be any better than a stock light!

 

[zach_1_6]

Thank you guys so much! I just don't want to spend the money and have it not be any better than a stock light!

have you looked into other lights? or do you want to stay in the low to low/medium light range? there are many options that will give you the ability to grow more, higher light plants.

 

[BHead707]

well the fixture your getting is a T5 High output light which is one of the better forms of lighting at the moment(what i am told). so yes it will be better than stock

and the 10k color temp has something to do with the spectrum of light it produces and i believe you want something between 6.5k-10k to grow lights in an aquarium

(i hope thats all accurate! )

 

[zach_1_6]

well the fixture your getting is a T5 High output light which is one of the better forms of lighting at the moment(what i am told). so yes it will be better than stock

and the 10k color temp has something to do with the spectrum of light it produces and i believe you want something between 6.5k-10k to grow lights in an aquarium

(i hope thats all accurate! )

whoops i didn't see it was a t5-HO lol. and yes you would want a bulb from the 6500k to 10 000k range.

 

[Justme68]

Hi guys, I'm just wanting low to medium light plants and I don't want to have to dose co2! I don't want something so strong to just promote algae either...lol. I've been reading so much and I'm very confused and I see where a lot of the threads end up with people saying you want such and such and someone else says that won't work. HELP

 

[Coursair]

Hi guys, I'm just wanting low to medium light plants and I don't want to have to dose co2! I don't want something so strong to just promote algae either...lol. I've been reading so much and I'm very confused and I see where a lot of the threads end up with people saying you want such and such and someone else says that won't work. HELP

This might be too much light if you don't want CO2.

 

[Justme68]

Is there anything you can suggest coursair?

 

[BHead707]

Is there anything you can suggest coursair?

what im doing is putting one 10k bulb and one blue bulb in my fixture, the light is a little weird but it essentially reduces the usable light it puts out, cause 2 10k bulbs would be way to much light for my tank

 

[Coursair]

what im doing is putting one 10k bulb and one blue bulb in my fixture, the light is a little weird but it essentially reduces the usable light it puts out, cause 2 10k bulbs would be way to much light for my tank

That sounds better. You can also have floating plants to further reduce light levels.