# Amano and planted aquarium light



## Left C (Nov 15, 2003)

I found these following two articles about blue and red light in planted aquariums interesting from ADA's online magazine as well as Amano's article in the January 2009 issue of TFH called "Lighting the Nature Aquarium." Amano speaks about the importance of blueish lighting in planted aquariums and that bulbs with a lot of red in their color spectrum are mainly for terrestrial plants. Most plant bulbs that we have available for planted aquariums have a lot of blue and a lot of red in them. Amano found that a plant bulb in the ~ 8000K range worked well. 

Articles:
STORIES BEHIND vol.001 -NA Lamp-

Light Transmissivity in Water


Online magazine: http://www.adana.co.jp/aj_web/


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## plantbrain (Dec 15, 2003)

Another light based sales pitch..........using the term "nature" to do it.

As far as light goes in the submersed/wetland environment, color temps are not important as all that mumbo sales talk. Your perception of color is more what this is all about and this has been the case for many years.

I can measure and quanatify ADA lighting easily using PAR meters and have used two different meters now, one a cheap, but rather accurate Apogee and the other is LiCOR freshly callibrated (as was the Apogee) with the sphererical sensor. The spherical sensor has about 10% higher reading at most locations.
This is due to reflecions(water, turbidity, plants, gravel, rocks etc).
I posted these results awhile ago here and on my web site.

As far as light in water, this also is *Extremely* easy to measure ourselves as well, even the newest hobbyists can do this in a few minutes.

Do a large water change, measure with and without water, few folks have more than 24" deep tanks(60 or so cm), there's not much color temp changes and most aqutic plants live and grow best at 1 meter or less in natural habitats.

This talk is sales, not research or science.
Plant adapt to whatever light is available and it is measured in micromoles/m^2/Sec. This addresses the issues of color temps and selective removal etc. It focuses on what plants use to grow. It does not mean they prefer anything one way or the other. 

Also of issue, most aquatic plants are marsh plants, they do not live deep in the forest(a few do,, some Crypts, not all, a few things like Anubias and few ferns/moss etc........ but most do not), where filtering from other plants is a huge deal, that's why they live in the water where there is less canopy. 

Most live out in the open. This is true in the tropics as well as the temperate regions. If you want things to look nice a green, use green light to high light them. This is not about the best growth, it's about looking nice to us, our eyes. Like redder plants? Use bulbs with redder light output. 

As far as the amount of light put out, it's really quite low based on the 5 systems I measured at Aqua Forest, painfully low, 2-3x what my Coralife set up is at the same watt/watt ratio on the same sized tank and at similar distances.

You better have some good marketing , pictures, talk etc to sell it because growth rates alone are not going to do it. They look good, but perform very inefficiently, less light = more wiggle room though. Whether or not that(much lower light than you might think) is on purpose, I have _no clue._ But it would lend a lot to methods suggested and reduce the errors of folks using the entire system and set up.

I think measuring 6 ADA systems, with and without PC/HQI's, comparing them to similar wattages of other systems, comparing the bulbs as well to be sure, is enough tanks to show a pattern, and they where all pretty close(within about +/-10% in PAR).

1-2 tanks is not enough to say much.
Problem is, folks cannot afford more than maybe 1 or 2 ADA tanks/light set up. They also need a method/instrument that can measure light based on the relevant parameter for comparing tanks, color temps, depths, water(with or without) etc.

We measure this stuff every week in various depth columns at the lab. Aquatic weeds growing at different depths is an important issue relating to rates of growth.Water levels change here, we also deal with the tidal influences of the delta here which can and does change the depths by 4-6 ft 2x a day.

They look nice, color temps are pleasing to the eye looking at green plants, they put out a lot less light than other brands I've looked at.

That's all I can conclude, the rest sounds like marketing mumbo.
I have no clue why they measured anything in lux, nor go into color temps and depth. Also, is this with plants and water, or just empty tanks?

You do not get the feedback and asking such questions rarely gets you an answer from ADA that's meaningful. If you give folks information and nice little story etc..............give them some info that is useful also. 

Aquatic plants might not prefer blue light at all, it's just all that's down there at that moment. Water levels change dramatical in wetlands, as does light, that's why we measure it there over time:thumbsup: Its red lower wavelength component goes up and down. Depends on _when_ you go there. Year, month, season, week, day,hour etc.

Part of the year they have plenty of longer wavelength red light. So is this a real understanding of Nature and Ecology? Does not seem like it to me. Seems like "Nature" is a marketing term rather than something to really learn more about. 


Regards, 
Tom Barr


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## Left C (Nov 15, 2003)

Thanks Tom for explaining it so well.

I originally wrote my response to those articles as being hype, but I changed my response from some comments to ... Well, here it is. This is what Amano is saying. Read it if you want to. I really didn't have any data to back up my responses except for one thing.

I've tried their 36w 8000K bulbs and they don't work quite as well as 40w dual daylight 6700K/10,000K bulbs made by Current. The Current bulbs make my plants pearl much better, but I liked the way the 8000K bulbs make my aquarium look.

Left C


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