# A simple light test to show HIGH light is NOT required for nice aquascapes-Who knew?



## epicfish

Thanks for the info, Tom. Sad I couldn't make it today to the meet!

When you talk about T5 putting out more light than comparative ADA fixtures, which specific brands are you talking about, because don't reflectors definitely affect how much light is directed back into the tank?


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## plantbrain

TEK and Archaea brands........

I think it's a hoot how folks carry on endlessly about light, try and tell what experts they are never once having tested the parameter that matters most to plants. Then launch into this huge thing with Lux, and lumens, color temps and scaling Watt/gal rules and how bad those are, how we can use all these tables and correlations, then how someone(curiously rarely ever themselves) or a bunch of folks should pool their efforts and a ton of useless data........... I have never claimed to be an expert, but I do know what I know.

With aquatic plants, measuring light is pretty critical.

With the cost of the PAR meters dropping to the ranges where typical hobby folks can buy them(149$ with a group buy), some are finally coming around, then these can be shared and folks can understand and learn a lot more than all this mish mash mumbo that never got anyone anywhere other than a time black hole. We had two at the event.

I was a bit myth at how low the light values where.
Lower than I expected, I'm not impressed with the ADA light efficiency after this look at each typoe, this goes for the PC and the HQI.

Yea, they look nice, but they really do not put out much light.
But this makes targeting a good CO2 ppm easier.

I think folks have been saying this for over 20 years now, you do not need high light to pull off nice scapes, to grow (you fill in the blank) species of plant.

I've tested it in my own tanks, my friend's tanks, my client's tanks, Aqua Forest's ADA tank's, Sat there and asked a large group of folks in 5 different plant clubs what they thought after seeing the readings, and watching me take the measurements. I'm not just making stuff up, isolated alone in some lab basement and posting whatever. I'm not measuring one isolated case.

I'm talking dozens of tanks, dozen owners and time periods with so called "hard to grow" species.

This is not some aberration. I do not know what type of evidence folks need to realize this. What proof do they need to prove it to themselves?

Adding so much light causes many a great deal of problems and yet so many willingly tell folks to add lots of light. 

I think it's some folks have troubles, then conclude poorly what they believe "cured" their tank's issues, or they see someone else's tank and think there's some trick. There's no "trick". 

But if you are that poor person that cannot grow Tonia etc, you will believe anything. Unless you have the control and enough other folks to check yourself, your tanks, compare things in person, it's rather hard to conclude much. If you do, then you have much more a consensus. I ask folks to tell me what they think, I some them and let them decide.

While this works great in person, it does not work so well on the web as they cannot see what you have done/are doing etc. This is why folks should join/form a club locally if possible. Many folks have 2 or more tanks that they treat pretty much the same but they can act very differently. 


Epicfish: missed out, it was cramped event, but there where a lot of plants and folks there having fun. Got to try out my Canon 5D finally. Should see what the pics look like later.


I'll post some later

Regards, 
Tom Barr


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## epicfish

Tom, yep, definitely missed out. I'll be back in the Sacramento area soon and will be looking forward to attending some SAPS meets also. 

I've observed what you have too with my own PAR meter. I started to grow tired of the constant trimmings of my plants, especially the stems and significantly dropped lighting levels, expecting the majority of the "high light" plants to die off...much to my surprise, they did just as well. Maybe a tad slower growth, but they were surviving and growing!

I only use very intense lighting in my grow-out tanks to grow enough to start a new tank; otherwise, I stick to lower lighting and still grow plants just as well.

I've also noticed a recent trend, especially in the last few years, on the forums where low, mid, and high light levels are bumped up higher and higher as time goes on. It used to be 2.5 WPG+ for a high light tank, and now people recommend 3, 3.5, even up to 4 WPG for a high light tank. Even on 100 gallon tanks, I'll see recommendations for 2.5 WPG...definitely overkill. I measured the PAR in a friend's 120 gallon tank with 160 watts of PC lighting over it...about the same as my 20 gallon tank with 48 watts over it.


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## jjp2

Tom,

I beleive this makes a lot of sense based on how Amano's tanks look and your analysis of the ADA product line. If the lights were high intensity, I would think those tanks would have issues because the balance of light/ferts/CO2 would be off.


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## plantbrain

jjp2 said:


> Tom,
> 
> I beleive this makes a lot of sense based on how Amano's tanks look and your analysis of the ADA product line. If the lights were high intensity, I would think those tanks would have issues because the balance of light/ferts/CO2 would be off.


Yea, but like many things, no one bothered to test the parameters that matter:icon_roll

I suggested it, but it got lost in the fray and the mystique of "Amano", that's good marketing for ya. 

Ironic thing is, many associate me with EI which suggest doing away with test kits (heresy for some!), yet here I go in front of a large crowd "testing".

Not really a test, just an observation to show what is really going on.
Easier than doing a NO3 test , I'll tell ya that much

Okay, yada yada, yacky yack, time to post some pics:

no#20 in the ADA world ranking and the top entry in the USA:









This is the specific tank I mentioned(180cm). It's pretty low light, the distance from the light to the water is 12".



















Tell me why the plants can grow at such low light please?
Anyone naysayers like to show that this is just btrick photography and that every single SFBAAPS member is in cahoots on this BIG lie? hehe

Come on..........50 folks are not going to lie about any of this. There are 5 full ADA tanks here from small to large, everyone had the same story to tell.

Steve and George spend a lot of time working here and working on the tanks and they have 2 folks working for them including family members. Kudos to them for doing this and supporting the hobby as well.
_Work _does pay off in the scaping, in business and in the hobby.

Regards, 
Tom Barr


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## plantbrain

epicfish said:


> Tom, yep, definitely missed out. I'll be back in the Sacramento area soon and will be looking forward to attending some SAPS meets also.


Stop on by, I might make you buy something I have too much of



> I've observed what you have too with my own PAR meter. I started to grow tired of the constant trimmings of my plants, especially the stems and significantly dropped lighting levels, expecting the majority of the "high light" plants to die off...much to my surprise, they did just as well. Maybe a tad slower growth, but they were surviving and growing!


Ye hath become thy faithful compatriot!
We should go forth and rise to the pulpit, and preach the gospel of lower light, for thy brigth light that He shines upon us is too great to recreate and look upon, we humbly shall bow down and use less and be frugal with our light. Then we shall be blessed and grow thy garden full of bounty.



> I only use very intense lighting in my grow-out tanks to grow enough to start a new tank; otherwise, I stick to lower lighting and still grow plants just as well.


This is pretty much what I find also.
It's nice to leave for vacation and turn things "down".



> I've also noticed a recent trend, especially in the last few years, on the forums where low, mid, and high light levels are bumped up higher and higher as time goes on.


Yes, some think more is better(unless it's CO2 or nutrients:icon_roll ).
I call it HLD, or high light disease.
Been bad for many years now and a serious problem in the hobby.



> It used to be 2.5 WPG+ for a high light tank, and now people recommend 3, 3.5, even up to 4 WPG for a high light tank. Even on 100 gallon tanks, I'll see recommendations for 2.5 WPG...definitely overkill. I measured the PAR in a friend's 120 gallon tank with 160 watts of PC lighting over it...about the same as my 20 gallon tank with 48 watts over it.


Well, if you also consider the higher light tanks in the 1990's, they had NO FL's, they are about 1/2 what the T5's are today, so it's 2-4X what folks need. Good thing I used MH's and high light PC's for my max assumptions for EI. 

But plants do well in both cases, they just grow slower, and things are much easier to manage.

But as experienced aquarists, I think folks should really help newbies out by suggesting low light and not telling them to get 3-4 W/gal. Stick with 2w/gal or so. That's always been a good range in every case I've seen.

With more PAR meters and folks using them floating around, some more concrete data and comparisons between tanks can be done and the trends are pretty clear.

Lower light is generally better and much easier to care for, more light = more work.

Help fight HLD:thumbsup:

Same light PAR values here:










Regards, 
Tom Barr


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## eyebeatbadgers

plantbrain said:


> Ye hath become thy faithful compatriot!
> We should go forth and rise to the pulpit, and preach the gospel of lower light, for thy brigth light that He shines upon us is too great to recreate and look upon, we humbly shall bow down and use less and be frugal with our light. Then we shall be blessed and grow thy garden full of bounty.


It's going to take a way more cheesy schtick than that for people to buy into your strategy, and pay way too much for it! I'm glad you're doing the testing for us, I for one appreciate the information. I had a sneaking suspicion lots of folks were overshooting how much light is really needed, we aren't growing reefs after all


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## plantbrain

eyebeatbadgers said:


> It's going to take a way more cheesy schtick than that for people to buy into your strategy, and pay way too much for it! I'm glad you're doing the testing for us, I for one appreciate the information. I had a sneaking suspicion lots of folks were overshooting how much light is really needed, we aren't growing reefs after all


Well a fellow reefer was there and we talked about that also
But this is not the place for marine yabbering

I try cheese if they will not bite red meat:redface:

Regards, 
Tom Barr


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## fishscale

Hey Tom, I have a question about my own tank. I am running a 1x55W Coralife CFL over a 20L. By wpg rules, this would be quite high. I am not sure a 20g tank should use the wpg rule. However, I feel that there is not enough light in the tank. This may be due to the fact that the length of the bulb doesn't cover enough of the tank, or that the reflectors are not very good (I am considering replacing it with a spare AH Supply I have). I am considering switching it to a 2x55W with the second light run on a burst. I am not sure if this would be too much light.


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## epicfish

plantbrain said:


> Stop on by, I might make you buy something I have too much of


I'll be looking forward to a visit!



plantbrain said:


> Ye hath become thy faithful compatriot!
> We should go forth and rise to the pulpit, and preach the gospel of lower light, for thy brigth light that He shines upon us is too great to recreate and look upon, we humbly shall bow down and use less and be frugal with our light. Then we shall be blessed and grow thy garden full of bounty.


Oh I've been trying to get people to use less light! And like always, if 2WPG is good enough, 4WPG will make my tank look 200% better! And two weeks later, you see "HELP! ALGAE IN MY TANK!" posts.


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## youareafever

good info especially since i was planning on buying lighting soon for my tank.


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## manhatton

These are very interesting results:thumbsup:. 

Tom, what do you attribute the diminished performance of the ADA to? (Ballast drive?Bulbs?etc...)
Do you think this arrangement may be intentional? I'm sure by now they would have figured as you did, that success is attainable at the lower intensities. 


Mmmm, yes, a PAR meter would be nice.....


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## bradac56

manhatton said:


> Mmmm, yes, a PAR meter would be nice.....


What we should be asking is what PAR meter is Tom using?
(So I can get a new toy).

- Brad


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## plantbrain

manhatton said:


> These are very interesting results:thumbsup:.
> 
> Tom, what do you attribute the diminished performance of the ADA to? (Ballast drive?Bulbs?etc...)
> Do you think this arrangement may be intentional? I'm sure by now they would have figured as you did, that success is attainable at the lower intensities.
> 
> 
> Mmmm, yes, a PAR meter would be nice.....


149$, group buys help.
Reef folks are much more willing to drop big coin for testing.
But the device cost have dropped a great deal. I used a LiCor unit at UC Santa Barbara and it ran 600$ for the cheapest model. The others with the 360 degree 3D directions ran about 900$ alone for the integrating sensor. Not cheap stuff.

I just measured my Coralife lights, 650 micro moles at the same distance, but down where the plants are I found about 2-3x as much light as the 3x 150 W ADA lights.

I use a 3x 150 W HQI's(8000K as well), but also use 4x 96 W 6700K coralife bulbs also. 

I'm not sure what ADA thinks.
Nor know if it was intentional or not. 
But if you did design something and folks think more is better, and you want them to have success, and you do not want to tell them about it............you could speculate that.

It is a weird thing: human perceptions/behaviors. They love "more is better" when it comes to light, "less is better" when it comes to the water column, but CO2 is not a critical issue nor is testing the sediment sources of nutrients and ppms.

All aquatic plant growth studies measure light in research. The issue for hobbyists is having a parameter to test that we can compare with under a wide range of artificial light sources and set ups(like nature and the differences we fin lake to lake, stream to stream, depth to depth, turbid water vs clear and so on).

I will say that the lighting system is much less than other brands as far as PAR, this certainly does account for a large degree of success and reduced growth rates. It also supports that good stable CO2 + low light works perhaps best for most folks looking to "garden". Easier than higher light systems. I do not think ADA will ever tell you that their lights put out much less PAR than other lights(that - would not be good sales/marketing!). But it does seem like this is the case here and I measured several tank set ups over the few months now. I think it's smarter to write poems and make jokes instead of answer such questions if I where them.

And in a sense, they are helping combat HLD. :thumbsup:

Still, many have long claimed there "are many ways to do this hobby" and " much we do not yet know", the folks that buy Hydrilla pills and holistic marketing, I collectively refer to as the defeatist critics. We already do know what drives a method to work, whether it is low light, non CO2, fish waste and sediment nutrient sources, medium light to low light Excel dosing, low, medium, high light CO2 gas systems, and why a leaner system can work whereas for others, richer works better.

The issue is not there are little gnomes and magic, or that "we do not know", the issue is the rate of growth changes, and this is 1st driven in every case by light. Then by CO2, then by nutrients. Limitations can be mild/slight, medium intensity or strongly limiting. It's not this black and white issue.

If you want to reduce the rates of growth, the wisest solution is to limit light(this is where all growth starts) and it's also one of the easiest parameters to measure if you have a PAR meter. It's also far easier to meet any goal you may have for whatever reason with nutrients and with CO2 by reducing or raising light intensity.

Ahh.......who knew?

I've heard rants about how folks cannot have these nice tanks unless they have high light and then used watt data for support for the ADA tanks.
Fine, but I knew something was up and this proved it.

Now this was with the HQI lights on, Amano often uses just the PC lights for 10 hours etc, and does the 3 hour blast in the middle of day only.

So the light is even less most of the day.
Chew on that cattail.

Regards, 
Tom Barr


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## plantbrain

bradac56 said:


> What we should be asking is what PAR meter is Tom using?
> (So I can get a new toy).
> 
> - Brad


The Apogee is quite good for the $ it cannot be beat. 
I have a LiCOR, but honestly, it's 5-10X as much and you do not get much more meter.

Here's the group buy folks:

http://www.reefcast.com/groupbuy.php

Enjoy and test test test!

Also, a fun thing is to measure the tops of stem plants as they grow.
The light goes way way up as they get near to the surface. What happens to the RATE of growth?

Is it linear and steady? Or does it increase exponentially? How might that influence CO2, flow and nutrient uptake?

How might rate of growth affect color of certain species? Ah...........who knew you could look at and answer so much and compare other aquarists tanks so well? 

I wish they made a CO2 meter that was this cheap

Regards, 
Tom Barr


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## Crystalview

Have you only been testing with the PAR on CO2 tanks and not on non CO2 tanks?
It would seem that growth rate in the ADA tanks are still based on CO2 and ferts amounts. With my non CO2 tank I adjusted the EI dosage down. Were the CO2 and ferts also reduced with the amount of light that they use in the ADA tanks or kept at the dosage for high light rates?


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## Hoppy

Unless I am very much mistaken, ADA tanks, meaning those set up in ADA stores to promote ADA products, take advantage of Aquasoil to provide most of the nutrients for the plants. The ADA line of fertilizers seems aimed only at supplementing those substrate nutrients. I know Amano doesn't use a drop checker, even though ADA was the first to sell the elegant little glass one. When it first came out I asked Jeff how it should be used, and his answer was that Amano doesn't use one. So, I assume Amano just adds CO2 by watching the plants and fish.


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## Riiz

Hoppy said:


> Unless I am very much mistaken, ADA tanks, meaning those set up in ADA stores to promote ADA products, take advantage of Aquasoil to provide most of the nutrients for the plants. The ADA line of fertilizers seems aimed only at supplementing those substrate nutrients. I know Amano doesn't use a drop checker, even though ADA was the first to sell the elegant little glass one. When it first came out I asked Jeff how it should be used, and his answer was that Amano doesn't use one. So, I assume Amano just adds CO2 by watching the plants and fish.



I personally use the same method too, I dont really use my checker unless the fish are acting a bit weird. Bad me, but oh well.

But Amano must using some device or method to determine his CO2 levels, cause with any published work of his, CO2 is stated in bubble per seconds and mg/l. Maybe he just guessing at that figure, who knows.


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## Hoppy

Riiz said:


> I personally use the same method too, I dont really use my checker unless the fish are acting a bit weird. Bad me, but oh well.
> 
> But Amano must using some device or method to determine his CO2 levels, cause with any published work of his, CO2 is stated in bubble per seconds and mg/l. Maybe he just guessing at that figure, who knows.


Bubbles per second is only good for verifying that you have a stable flow of CO2. Obviously one bubble per second coming out of an open CO2 tube under water isn't the same as one bubble per second going into an external reactor or one bubble per second going into a venturi used to inject CO2. 

A drop checker is just a way to get in the ballpark for the right amount to inject. It keeps you from injecting a paltry 5 ppm, thinking you are close to killing the fish, something more common than you might think. But, once the drop checker is green all you know is that at that location in the tank you have between 20 and 45 ppm of CO2, which may still not be as much as you want for other locations in the tank. From that point on you have to either pay $1000+ for a CO2 meter, or you have to judge the plants and fish reactions to "fine tune" the bubble rate. I suspect Amano is experienced enough to "fine tune" his CO2 bubble rate without any measuring device at all.

And, knowing that ADA tanks are not high light tanks, means the needed concentration of CO2 is less and not nearly as critical, making the "fine tuning" a lot easier.


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## Riiz

Hoppy, I meant Amano must use some device other than a bubble counter or drop checker, because of the "mg/l" values he publishes with his work, hehe.


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## Church

He also publishes a saturated O2 content, too, which I've never understood... how is he measuring the amount of dissolved O2? And please, God, tell me he's not injecting O2 into the tank?! Can you say "KABOOOM!!!!" ??

(I'm sure that he either has badass multi-controllers, or he estimates)


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## fishscale

I didn't mean to derail with my post, but I was just wondering, since my situation could technically qualify as high light disease. Just eyeballing it, it doesn't look like enough light when I switch it on. For the record, this tank currently has no fish, so the CO2 is cranked way up. I am dosing EI.


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## Hoppy

Riiz said:


> Hoppy, I meant Amano must use some device other than a bubble counter or drop checker, because of the "mg/l" values he publishes with his work, hehe.


I suspect (I'm not a close confidante of Amano!) that he measures KH and pH and uses the table for his mg/L values.


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## plantbrain

Church said:


> He also publishes a saturated O2 content, too, which I've never understood... how is he measuring the amount of dissolved O2? And please, God, tell me he's not injecting O2 into the tank?! Can you say "KABOOOM!!!!" ??
> 
> (I'm sure that he either has badass multi-controllers, or he estimates)


Measuring O2 is easy. DO probe and meter. I've only met one other hobbyist in 20+ years that's used an O2 meter in planted tanks other than myself.

O2 measurements, any gas measurement, need a time and light time associated with it.

Otherwise, such data is meaningless............

Regards, 
Tom Barr


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## plantbrain

Hoppy said:


> I suspect (I'm not a close confidante of Amano!) that he measures KH and pH and uses the table for his mg/L values.


Yes, but the tap they use at ADA's show room has about 0.5ppm or so PO4's, I'm not sure how the KH is influenced and it alos matters a great deal when the CO2 ppm was measured and where the sample was taken from in the tank.

Having used high grade CO2 meters, the data provided in every book from ADA has been way too similar to be correct. 

Both O2 and CO2 can and do change depending on where and when you they are taken, hour to hour etc.

Regards, 
Tom Barr


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## die2win

Wow, that was some read! Thank you for this thread :fish:


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## plantbrain

In order to compare light and the various types etc and plant growth, you must measure a standardized parameter, PAR. 

No one has bothered, so I decided to see.:thumbsup:
I'm a bit slow to getting around to things, but I do mull them over and over and over a few times.

No nothings want to believe that somehow mysterious gnomes "can grow plants without hardly any nutrients and yet they grow" like this is some special discovery they have found.

Then they hold the cheesy NO3 test kit as some sort of evidence and they have not confirmed and checked, standardized their light nor the CO2.

Reeeeal careful in their conclusions:redface:

Then they poo poo on other folks, like me when I suggest they might have other factors driving the growth rates they are not accounting for. But of course they KNOW they are right even thought they have never tested it, then go after me for EI and suggesting folks do not use test kits.

The irony is too great.

The lower bounds will be rather tough and hard to find, but we can certainly do well at 40-50 micromols at the bottom for any aquarium I'd say.

If the readings are 40-50 all over the bottom, then it's safe to say you can grow pretty much most any plant you want.

Here's an HC example from this very same tank about a year ago:

A 60cm:









And the same 180cm:









Feel free to serve up some crow to the naysayers...........the folks with HLD........

George Booth would be proud

Regards, 
Tom Barr


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## Oscar17

Very enlighting..

Sorry for the stupid question, but is the light meter submersible? If not, how do you get the PAR reading at the bottom of the tank?

Thanks, Oscar


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## epicfish

Oscar17 said:


> Very enlighting..
> 
> Sorry for the stupid question, but is the light meter submersible? If not, how do you get the PAR reading at the bottom of the tank?
> 
> Thanks, Oscar


Yes, the PAR meter is submersible.


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## Jens

epicfish said:


> Yes, the PAR meter is submersible.




I wouldn't try that. But the meter comes with a waterproof remote sensor.


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## epicfish

Jens said:


> I wouldn't try that. But the meter comes with a waterproof remote sensor.












Fair enough.


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## plantbrain

I loaned a meter to the guys at Aqua Forest and see and showed them a few ideas to explore. At the event they where busy working. They sell some other brands of T5 lights, so they can get good numbers and measure them as well.

Regards, 
Tom Barr


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## Oscar17

Very informative thread! Thanks to you all who are checking all these parameters and then posting them hear for us to read and learn about.

I always thought that we should be using Watts per Inch instead of WPG. Because, you could have a 50g long or a 50g tall. Both of these tanks have the same amount of gallons but one is deeper than the other.... don't we lose light intensity with depth of water?

We certainly have many different shapes and size tanks, so shouldn't we be asking "How many inches is the depth of your water?" and "What distance are your lights from the water surface?" then deciding how many watts we need to achieve 40-50 at the bottom.

Eagerly awaiting the numbers and measurements on the T5.


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## plantbrain

Well, the lights using the T5's at AF are about 320 at the surface right in the middle. 20 or so in the front corners, 40-50 in the less shaded corners, and about 120-150 in the middle.

This tank is about 35 cm from the tops of the foreground to the light, so it's pretty shallow. As far as water and absorbing light, it does so depending on the wavelength and this is where PAR units become more relevant.

Plants can and do adapt to various wavelengths, much like a forest, plant leaves will filter the light and the leaves under them get different wavelengths.

So forest floor plants which are low light are well adapted to such filtering, much like aquatic plants are also.

Some folks like to muck things up and talk a lot about theory and color temps, water filtering etc and perhaps never realize that PAR is the relevant driver of plant growth, not all the marketing garbage that light makers and old myth based aquarium articles have been supporting for many years.

Sadly, many are still stuck in that realm and it will take a long time to get many out of the muck:thumbsup:

As far as watts/inches of area etc, you still do not know what differences and the reading will be without using a meter. the meter makes the comparison simple and easy for any aquarium and any light setr up specific and individual for that tank.

That's the whole point here.
W/inch would not show the relationship I found here in other words.
We'd still think the lighting was much higher than it is. And the magic and myth would keep living..........

Regards, 
Tom Barr


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## Church

Tom, dude, I think it's time for you to write a book for the aquarium hobby! I'd buy it, for sure.


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## Revision17

Church said:


> Tom, dude, I think it's time for you to write a book for the aquarium hobby! I'd buy it, for sure.


He does have a subscription only news letter on his website. Definetely worth the $12 for all the content in there. Probably has more info than a typical "book" would have.


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## plantbrain

Well, as history often does repeat itself, some have suggested using various plans and data to play around with what it all means:

http://www.thekrib.com/Plants/Tech/Lighting/

The krib has had many smart folks come through and post, but many today have missed some gems.

I seek to go beyond this and go to the plant itself.
Using the PAR meter I can address the variations with a standard.

Thing was, they use to be 1000$+ and then 600$ or so, now after the group buy, about 199$.

So they have come way down in cost.
Still, the above link is what many had proposed.

I'm still not getting why so many folks claim ADA is high light and that's what you need etc. Red plants etc do very well at low light, take a look.

While the above link is good, you would miss the part about the actual PAR unit difference between say the Coralife vs the ADA unless you tested the light fixtures under real nice scaped conditions.

Such simple assumptions like this can lead us, and others to believe some rather kooky things. Even if you did do a nice chart, graph and comparisons, or had a nice scape example...................You can still easily be quite wrong. So checking things and making sure you did not over look things helps out a lot. I did not expect such a difference myself either, however, I checked. I do not trust myself. 

Regards, 
Tom Barr


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## Hoppy

A really great LFS would own PAR meter and lend it out with new tank/light fixture sales. Then, they would perhaps let the customer exchange the fixture for a different one if the PAR intensities were not within the desired range.


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## snafu

plantbrain said:


> Well, the lights using the T5's at AF are about 320 at the surface right in the middle. 20 or so in the front corners, 40-50 in the less shaded corners, and about 120-150 in the middle.


this is great data. it's interesting to point out just how much variation in light there is in different locations of the tank. light at the corners can be 15% of that in the middle of the tank. as you point out, i think this just shows the adaptability of plant. as long as we meet the minimum light threshold, plants will adapt to best use it.

it also shows that people who might have a 'high' light types of tank (depending on the placement, distribution, type of light, size of tank, etc), most likely have significant regions of lower light yet still grow their hard-to-grow plants without issue.


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## plantbrain

snafu said:


> this is great data. it's interesting to point out just how much variation in light there is in different locations of the tank. light at the corners can be 15% of that in the middle of the tank. as you point out, i think this just shows the adaptability of plant. as long as we meet the minimum light threshold, plants will adapt to best use it.
> 
> it also shows that people who might have a 'high' light types of tank (depending on the placement, distribution, type of light, size of tank, etc), most likely have significant regions of lower light yet still grow their hard-to-grow plants without issue.


Well, many old timers have long known they could grow really nice red plants at low light.

But I see this virtually every single day
" You need 3+ watt/gal to grow red plants........."

The variation in the aquarium is assumed to be fairly even...............and it's a bad assumption. Some suggest that the foreground plants need more starting light since they are so far away and assume that they are "high light plants".

Thing is, they have no real idea how much or what light level is good enough to produce a nice carpet. They have no reference and watts, brand etc is not really telling you the while story.

So they have really been guessing to make their statements/claims.
We all have.

However, I wonder why so many have gone to such EXCESS LIGHT intensities, tell others that they should also do the same, not having any clue, nor testing it with a standard reference, then have long poo pooed me for approaching NO3, PO4 etc.

Folks have gotten in deeply personal flame wars over such things, yet give light a free pass. 

I actually have tested, and know what the ranges are based on nice tanks. So then I can wander around and quickly test other folk's aquariums. I can see and measure where the low spots are, where the higher spots are. Measure how a stem plant is influenced by light and it's stem elongation as it approaches the surface.

Plants move and grow towards the light.
As this occurs, the PAR also change. If you trim them back, this remains stable. If you have less light, the rate of growth is slower, the system is more stable as far as CO2/nutrients.

The other highly variable thing in aquariums is the CO2.
Again, this has long been assumed to static and stable throughout the tank.
But that meter is 2000-3000$, not 200$.

Still, some simple research tools and test can show folks a lot.
I will be detailing out the ADA sediment(just ADA AS, and PS) for N, P, CEC, Fe and organic matter later and how I did that.

Few folks test and measure their nutrient rich sediments also and have long made some rather bad assumptions there. Hopefully common sense, good test methods, data that supports the results and the question/s asked will prevail over myths with time. Such questioning is not about light or ADA alone, it's information that can be applied broadly to aquatic horticulture.

Regards, 
Tom Barr


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## snafu

plantbrain said:


> Well, many old timers have long known they could grow really nice red plants at low light.
> 
> But I see this virtually every single day
> " You need 3+ watt/gal to grow red plants........."


another excellent point. i'm sure red vs green leaved plants have been studied for ages (and forgive me since i'm not a botanist), but i've read some things that suggest their photosynthetic capabilities are similar in spite of their color differences and that the anthocyanins (which give red leaves their color) is primarily used to protect the leaves from high intensity blue-green or UV light. in short, red plants can still grow nicely in lower light, but when it comes to very high light, red plants can continue to thrive while their green counterparts may undergo tissue or cell damage. i'd love for someone who know about such things to better educate us.


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## plantbrain

Given that logic, why aren't desert plants all red?
And......... why are most red plants found in forest floors in often shaded spots?

The reverse would suggest that red would mean => less light.
Not more red. Red color alone is not the whole issue(nor really the topic here). Even very green plants can have a large amount of Red pigments, they are just masked.

Why might a plant have red color at the tip that's newly formed and be dark green in the lower levels? 

New tips take time for formation and maturation, red pigments are added first, followed by Chl a and B, the pigments that give things the green color.

At higher rates of growth, you get faster production and thus more red tips........but this does not mean you get more red really , it's an issue of rate of the growth, not the red color really.

Plants that are naturally pretty red, stay pretty red in low light.
Plants that have red tips, tend to have more red tips at higher light.

This does not really mean that high light promotes red color, it just increases the rates of growth and what you see is more under developed growth tips, not redder color.

As most of the red color is from Carbon(CO2), you would want to have high CO2 and if you want good growth, non limiting N so you get plenty of Chl a.

So if you limit N, you get some plants appearing to have more red color, but it's just N limiting Chl a, which is pretty Nitrogen rich, the red pigments have no nitrogen at all. So the masking by Chl a is no longer such an issue, but the trade off is that you have to maintain a low, limiting N level at high rates of growth from that high light as well as high CO2.

That's a tougher balance................

ADA tanks are NOT N limited, there is plenty of N in the ADA aqua soil, just because you cannot test the N in the water column, does not imply anything unless you also look at sediments, something aquarist have NOT done eithern (I have).

Lots of folks telling other to test and to learn, but not doing much themselves........

Regards, 
Tom Barr


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## snafu

i didn't mean to imply that all plants that live in areas of high light should be red. as you point out there are many other factors at play, including leaf area, photosynthetic efficiency, etc. it's possible the red in some plants could have been an evolutionary trait to warn potential predators against eating the leaves increasing it's survival. who knows why plants have evolved the ways they have?

i was suggesting that red plants can have similar photosynthetic capability as green plants and thus red does not necessarily equate to high light. also, the red pigmentation has the purpose (among many) to protect plants against high light. it's also one of the reasons young leaves might start off red and they change as they mature?


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## plantbrain

snafu said:


> Who knows why plants have evolved the ways they have?


Such questions have been asked by Darwin and others and have been tested in the field to measure things like gene flow/exchange, fecundicity/reproduction, flowering traits, phenology, related ancestery. Evolution is a hard science. It can be tested, measured etc. 

How a plant survived and came to be this way is a central question. 
All it means is that at this point and time, that's what managed to survive all the havoc nature threw at it. Same for us.



> i was suggesting that red plants can have similar photosynthetic capability as green plants and thus red does not necessarily equate to high light. also, the red pigmentation has the purpose (among many) to protect plants against high light. it's also one of the reasons young leaves might start off red and they change as they mature?


Yep, true. While some have suggested protection, think about those nice developing tips............why might they be redder closer to the light? I'd say you are right some here. I think there are other reasons besides protection, under water, a lot of light is attenuated anyway. Also, the development process takes more time to make Chl a vs those easy to make red pigments.

So it's likely just a function of developmental processes as well. At higher rates of growth, you have less time to develop the green at the new tips.
At lower light, you have less growth and therefore more time, better development overall.

Besides N, you could limit Mg to reduce the amount of Chl a. Mg is less critical to enzymes in most systems, but then again, going too far......like N.....leads to problems.

Still, bottom line, moist any method is easier with low light and all the pretty pictures with ADA, have these lower lights I'd assume based off these readings. When Amano takes a nice pic, he uses a lot of light and makes the tank look very bright, during the set up, this causes some plants to pearl really nice also. Flashes do not do that.

Regards, 
Tom Barr


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## Dempsey

With all this being said, and having no PAR meter; is there some kind of standard of say, "I have this fixture over my whatever sized tank, how high should I prop the light"? For example; I have a 75g with a 48" Coralife CF fixture with 4x65 Watt bulbs. How high should I prop it up? As of now I have the lights on timers so all four are never on for more then 2 hours at once. I do like the way the tank looks with all of the lights on though... That being said and not wanting to spend the money right away for a PAR meter, How high would I have to keep my fixture from the surface of the water in order to keep all four lights on for 8 hrs a day? Assuming all my other parameters are correct, of course.....


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## Hoppy

You really have to test each light fixture to determine how much light it gives at various distances. I have enough data on T5HO fixtures to be able to guess reasonably well how much light they give, and a little data on AH Supply light kits that lets me guess a bit less well how much light they give. But, I have no data on the Coralife PC fixtures. For them, all I can do is guess, based on my AH Supply data. See http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/lighting/97622-par-data-selecting-t5ho-light.html for that information. A standard 75 gallon 4 foot long tank is 20 inches high. That fixture must use two rows of 2 bulbs, so any point in the tank effectively gets light from 2 bulbs. The reflectors used are not nearly as effective as AH Supply reflectors, so I can assume you get around 3/4 of the light that you would get from an AHS fixture. So, I would guess that you get around 70 micromols of light at the substrate level with that fixture, and that is medium intensity, where pressurized CO2 is a very good idea, but not necessarily at the maximum bubble rate that the fish can tolerate.

If you don't have CO2, you should raise the light enough to get low intensity. That would be about 4-6 inches above the top of the tank.


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## Dempsey

Thanks, Hoppy!

That's actually where I have it now. I also have pressurized CO2 to the point that my drop checker gets yellowish green in color. I did test by watching the fish and having to turn the CO2 down a bit. 

So are you saying it should be safe to keep all 4 lights on for the full 8 hrs with where I have them now, height wise? That would be 3.4wpg. Maybe doing this would stop making my plants "reach" for the sky...

EDIT:
This would explain why some of my plants have been not doing so good......They used to pearl like crazy! I lowered the "burst time". It seems that the plants that reach the top of the tank, get their colors and look great! ;but the bottoms of them look mad(same plants),and even melt. I did have some fert issues(my fault)that i fixed. This can also explain why since I lowered my "Burst time" i dont get much pearling. I will slowly increase my "all lights on" and see how that works. I was always told "3.4wpg of PC!, you are crazy!" I really learned allot today! Thanks to you(Hoppy!) and Tom! Thank you both for your input! You know what though....... I kinda like messing around and testing all methods.... As long as my fish are okay


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## TheRac25

I realy like this, lower the light -> plants compensate with more chlorophyll -> plants look greener therefore look better. and less algea less power consumed less worry


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## biggecko

this light seems it would compeat for a nice price too http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/myTanks/42-Wö£fëñxXx.html


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## Zareth

I know this is quite old but after reading the posts on red colored plants I had to speak/ask.



plantbrain said:


> Given that logic, why aren't desert plants all red?
> And......... *why are most red plants found in forest floors in often shaded spots?*
> 
> The reverse would suggest that red would mean => less light.
> Not more red. Red color alone is not the whole issue(nor really the topic here). *Even very green plants can have a large amount of Red pigments, they are just masked.*
> 
> Why might a plant have red color at the tip that's newly formed and be dark green in the lower levels?
> 
> New tips take time for formation and maturation,* red pigments are added firs*t, followed by Chl a and B, the pigments that give things the green color.
> 
> *At higher rates of growth, you get faster production and thus more red tips........but this does not mean you get more red really , it's an issue of rate of the growth, not the red color really.*
> 
> Plants that are naturally pretty red, stay pretty red in low light.
> Plants that have red tips, tend to have more red tips at higher light.
> 
> This does not really mean that high light promotes red color, it just increases the rates of growth and what you see is more under developed growth tips, not redder color.
> 
> As most of the red color is from Carbon(CO2), you would want to have high CO2 and if you want good growth, non limiting N so you get plenty of Chl a.
> 
> So if you limit N, you get some plants appearing to have more red color, but it's just N limiting Chl a, which is pretty Nitrogen rich, the red pigments have no nitrogen at all. So the masking by Chl a is no longer such an issue, but the trade off is that you have to maintain a low, limiting N level at high rates of growth from that high light as well as high CO2.
> 
> That's a tougher balance................
> 
> ADA tanks are NOT N limited, there is plenty of N in the ADA aqua soil, just because you cannot test the N in the water column, does not imply anything unless you also look at sediments, something aquarist have NOT done eithern (I have).
> 
> Lots of folks telling other to test and to learn, but not doing much themselves........
> 
> Regards,
> Tom Barr


Obviously you know that the reason a plant appears green or red is because that is the wavelength of light it is reflecting. 
It seems incredibly obvious to me that a forest floor plant would have far less red and blue light available to it after all the leaves above have absorbed it.
By forgoing the green reflecting pigments the plant can absorb the green light that most of the above leaves have ignored and bounced around the canopy and back to the ground. As a result the plant appears red because now there is no green light being reflected. 
And given that blue light has more energy and would penetrate a tree canopy better, that also explains why the plant didn't adapt to absorb red and green, thus appearing blue.


Do plants really have red pigments? I was under the impression that the LACK of chlorophyll, and thus the lack of a pigment that absorbs red, is what would cause a red color. Without chlorophyll red light is reflected. 

Are the red pigments really added first? Or is the chlorophyll just not there yet in certain stem plants? 
Why don't we see all leaves in all plants begin as red and then turn green?

So at a higher rate of growth the plant cannot transfer the chlorophyll as quickly to the new growth? It seems odd a plant can send everything it takes to grow yet not send chlorophyll with it. Maybe the plant just cannot produce enough because its nutrient requirements aren't being met when compared to the light its given. 

But at any rate, we should definitely stop abusing our energy bills by blasting miniature suns at our plants. I have a jalapeno pepper plant sitting in my living room over the winter - it gets practically no light, and definitely no direct light, and I've watered it maybe once... Its "metabolism" is so slow right now but it still looks healthy. The same is obviously true for most plants.
Light = photosynthesis. 
Photosynthesis needs co2 to happen, and nutrients are needed to create new plant cells and pigments, etc.

Edit: are there any plants with black leaves? That seems like photosynthetic Nirvana.


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## Hoppy

Zareth said:


> I know this is quite old but after reading the posts on red colored plants I had to speak/ask.
> 
> 
> 
> Edit: are there any plants with black leaves? That seems like photosynthetic Nirvana.


Yes, there are varieties of species of some tropical plants that have virtually black leaves. However, aren't we forgetting something? What we see, as far as color goes, is just a reflection of our capability of sensing different wave lengths of light. Those "black" leaves might be red, if human eyes were more sensitive to red colors. Or, they might be brightly colored if human eyes were sensitive to far infrared or ultraviolet. Our eyes are very poor detectors of radiation, as far as maintaining a "flat" response curve is concerned.


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## Zareth

Hoppy said:


> Yes, there are varieties of species of some tropical plants that have virtually black leaves. However, aren't we forgetting something? What we see, as far as color goes, is just a reflection of our capability of sensing different wave lengths of light. Those "black" leaves might be red, if human eyes were more sensitive to red colors. Or, they might be brightly colored if human eyes were sensitive to far infrared or ultraviolet. Our eyes are very poor detectors of radiation, as far as maintaining a "flat" response curve is concerned.


Err.. yes our perceptions of color are based off of what our eyes detect. 
But the concept of black is just the same - a very strong lack of reflection.
If you want to take it that way I could say that all plants are black, but human eyes just happen to be super sensitive to green..

Regardless of what our eyes see its easy to measure spectrums of light. You can detach any color notion from the wavelengths and think of color as only numbers. If a plant reflects 0 light its black, i don't care what you imagine black as looking like. And anything thats close to reflecting no light, or reflects very little light, is close to black. So what I want to know is how our eyes are poor detectors of radiation? They do brilliantly IMO, sure they cant see the 9 primary colors some snails can see(comprehend that!). And what the heck is maintaining a flat response curve supposed to mean? Response as in time, Milliseconds? Curve as in, somehow this response changes depending on what colors we're looking at? What?
Response Curve sounds like filler jargon for a theory you have no information to back. 
If a leaf appears black to us, its not debatable whether or not it is absorbing a broader spectrum of light. What matters isnt if "What we see, as far as color goes, is just a reflection of our capability of sensing different wave lengths of light." What matters is that compared to a green leaf, a black leaf IS absorbing more light. What I would have to wonder would be if the pigment absorbing the green light is merged with chlorophyll in the thylakoid membrane or if it is separate in the plant, thus providing no photosynthetic benefit.


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## Zareth

One thing that's fairly interesting is that there are flowers that appear solid white to us, but when viewed by a camera that see's UV light, there are what appear to be runway marking pointing directly to the stigma of the flower, as if saying "Hey here are my sex organs you bugs! Come pollinate me!" 
I'll try to figure out what flower it was. I think it was some kind of epiphyte. 
EDIT: I can't find a picture of the flower but it was an orchid.


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## Hoppy

Human eyes, on average, see yellows and greens very well, but are relatively insensitive to reds and blues. Plants "see" blues and reds much better than yellows and greens. We can't look at light and determine if the red is as intense as the yellow or as intense as the blue. If we think they look equally intense, a PAR meter would show the blue and red to be much more intense than the yellow. That is what I mean by saying human eyes do not have a "flat response" to color.

Black is not non-reflective at all wave lengths of light. It could be reflecting lots of red and near infrared and still look black to us. But, to a creature with eyes sensitive to reds, it would look red, not black. True "black", meaning virtually 100% non reflective, is a surface made up of needles with the points towards us. In fact that is one way to make a super absorber of light. Some black paints reflect quite a bit of light, while others reflect very little.

A black leaf may or may not be absorbing more light, because of the above. In fact a true 100% absorptive surface is invisible, not black.

I'm not just jerking you around. I'm just pointing out that our perception of light is often very poor.


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## Zareth

Hoppy said:


> Human eyes, on average, see yellows and greens very well, but are relatively insensitive to reds and blues. Plants "see" blues and reds much better than yellows and greens. We can't look at light and determine if the red is as intense as the yellow or as intense as the blue. If we think they look equally intense, a PAR meter would show the blue and red to be much more intense than the yellow. That is what I mean by saying human eyes do not have a "flat response" to color.
> 
> Black is not non-reflective at all wave lengths of light. It could be reflecting lots of red and near infrared and still look black to us. But, to a creature with eyes sensitive to reds, it would look red, not black. True "black", meaning virtually 100% non reflective, is a surface made up of needles with the points towards us. In fact that is one way to make a super absorber of light. Some black paints reflect quite a bit of light, while others reflect very little.
> 
> A black leaf may or may not be absorbing more light, because of the above. In fact a true 100% absorptive surface is invisible, not black.
> 
> I'm not just jerking you around. I'm just pointing out that our perception of light is often very poor.


Yes you're right. But the appearance of a color to any vision sensing organ/device is relative, and the way its described and talked about is based off of the way we see things. In black and white film photography we use an 18% gray card to help us determine the exposure levels to get skin tones and other things the right shade of gray. This reflects 18% of the light back, as far as a Lux/lumen meter is concerned. I know there is a significant different between lux and par because par takes into account the lesser value of green light. (Or I think it does, lemme know if that's not true) Its this reflectance that is the key. If you are monochromatic colorblind, or some kind of mutant with 6 primary color vision, either way you could pick out a black object from a bunch of dark red or dark blue ones, although dark red would be significantly difficult for a monochromat.
But yes just like you were saying, something the human eye see's as black might not be truly black, but the human eye is still detecting a lesser value of reflected light.
But all of that is irrelevant to the plant side of things. A black plant might be black because it has a type of cellulose that has different reflective properties than other plants, so it would be of no benefit to photosynthesis. But if a black chlorophyll molecule were accidentally produced in the plant, or if we could synthetically create something that acts as chlorophyll while absorbing more light/looking black to us(those things are synonymous and that's what my point is), then that plant might be very capable of extracting energy from the sun.


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## dewalltheway

Somehow in all my studying, I missed this thread and WOW...my head is spinning.

With all this information on PAR readings and microls we should be trying to reach and throwing the watts/gal rule out the door and then throwing in all different light types from T5HO to CF to LED and the different bulbs and reflectors to the different shapes, sizes and gallons of tanks available......breath........how does the average hobbiest, without all the metering equipment, determine what light will work for their tank in order to achieve growing nice, healthy plants? I mean, let's face it. Most people on TPT don't have degrees in marine biology or have the funds to support getting all the tech equipment from a PAR meter to aqua controllers but are people that want to go from having an aquarium with blue gravel and plastic plants to having a little ecosystem in a box. I understand that there is a whole lot more to having a planted tank and tons of different ideas along with alot of information to know then just sticking a plant in some substrate and hope it grows and that is why I am glad their are people like Tom and Hoppy and Orlando and many others that share their knowledge and experience with the rest of us and I thank you but like one of my fellow employees says all the time....please just K.I.S.S. it!


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## redfishsc

^ the answer to your question:

1) Browse the tanks people post, and replicate the lighting that successful people are using (and try to replicate their dosing/CO2 schedule). 

2) Look at local tanks, and mimic them.


Once you get started and watch your tank, watch others, and see others, you'll start getting a better idea. 


100% agreed, lighting can be a complicated (and terribly overpriced) beast.


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