# Slimming plants down. 24/7 lights?



## Aparker2005 (Jun 4, 2014)

Hey everyone. We're soon gonna be moving my 125 planted discus tank to another room and I'm planning ahead about how I want to rescape. 

I'm thinking I want to go to a less planted tank with a little more wood than plants this time. 

I want to have the back filled with Jungle Val, some java vern on my driftwood, and 3 Amazon swords. 

Not wanting an algae outbreak, would 2 36" Vivagrow or Planted Plus 24/7 lights work with these plants, on the 24/7 cycle, or would my 72" beamswork led work better for sustaining them? 

My wife especially loves the 24/7 lights. If these 3 plants will grow enough, I'll do that. 

I've got a pretty good planted tank now and it seems like I'm focusing more on the plants than the fish even though the discus are doing fine. I'd like to focus the tank on the fish more I guess with the awesome colored lights. 

Any opinions?


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## SwissCheeseHead (Dec 24, 2014)

The 3 plants you want to use can all be used in low light tanks. I don't know what the PAR values of the lights you have but i would use something that is considered low light.


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## Watercrayfish (Apr 21, 2016)

If you are not aware just a reminder.
The planted 24/7 is not dimmable while running on the 24/7 mode.

I was also thinking to get 24/7, but if I cant dim it on the 24/7 mode what is the point.


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## AbbeysDad (Apr 13, 2016)

My 60g has a 24" depth. I'm running the Finnex Planted+ 24/7 in 24/7 mode on a timer, on @6am off at midnight (I felt it stayed too bright in the wee hours). 
My substrate is silica (pool filter) sand. I'm growing Jungle Val, Amazon Swords, Wisteria, Crypt Wendtii, Anubias Nana, Java Fern, Java Moss, and Dwarf Sag. I'm using Flourish Root Tabs and very modest (less than the directions suggest) amounts of Flourish Comp and Flourish Trace. All of the plants are doing very well. Oh I had my initial bout with algae in the first few weeks (it was an already established tank before planting) before achieving balance, but it continues to fill in and look good! I'm very happy with the light and it's working great for low tech. If I was to go high tech, it would have to be on max for likely 6-8 hours. But for low tech, although it's at it's brightest for only 3+ hours a day, this combined with the intensity ramping up and down from sunrise to sunset seems to provide plenty of light for the plants. Although still a work in progress, below is a picture after 3 months.


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## Watercrayfish (Apr 21, 2016)

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## AbbeysDad (Apr 13, 2016)

Watercrayfish said:


> If you are not aware just a reminder.
> The planted 24/7 is not dimmable while running on the 24/7 mode.
> 
> I was also thinking to get 24/7, but if I cant dim it on the 24/7 mode what is the point.


With the way it ramps intensity up and down from sunrise to sunset, I'm not sure why you'd want to dim it down. However, when I had the initial algae challenge, I cut a piece of fiberglass window screen to lay on the canape below the light to act as a shade cloth (something I learned here in this forum). Worked GREAT in slightly reducing the intensity. Of course, once the algae was under control (and with my 24" depth) the screen came back off after a couple of days.


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## smackpixi (Feb 14, 2009)

The Finnex 24/7 has par stats around to help you decide if the 24/7 setting will give you the light you want. It definitely will be enough, and if too much you can use a screen. The Vivagrow will have less light, I've not seen par info so it's a bit of an unknown, but light level may be 50% Finnex or less...or more.

Bump: If you want, as you say, to make the Discus look good, you want controllable color temp to find what makes them pop. Both the fixtures you mention offer that (but not in 24/7 mode). There are others that do as well though costing more I believe. The Finnex 24/7 probably the safe bet until more is known about Vivagrow light output.


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## Aparker2005 (Jun 4, 2014)

I've had the 24/7s before, but only the 30" fixtures. My plants didn't grow and I had tons of algae. 

I thought the lights were the issue so I got rid of them. Turns out I was dosing full ei method in a low tech tank. Melted my plants and algae went crazy. 

That's why I'm thinking if I go back to the 24/7 lights, without the dosing like I was doing, I'll be just fine.


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## AbbeysDad (Apr 13, 2016)

Aparker2005 said:


> I've had the 24/7s before, but only the 30" fixtures. My plants didn't grow and I had tons of algae.
> 
> I thought the lights were the issue so I got rid of them. Turns out I was dosing full ei method in a low tech tank. Melted my plants and algae went crazy.
> 
> That's why I'm thinking if I go back to the 24/7 lights, without the dosing like I was doing, I'll be just fine.


Based on my experience, I'd agree. My tank was well established. When I got the new light I pulled the plastic decor and planted. The water chem was such that with the new (bright) light, the algae just took off at first. But after a period of light reduction and scrubbing, I got it under control. I have a lot of rooted plants, so (especially) with inert sand, I'm using root tabs. But I'm using very little macro/micro ferts in the water. Actually, I think in low tech, with the right bio-load, little if any chems are required. So in a manner of speaking, I'm listening to the plants to see what if any additives they need. My objective with the plants (in addition to naturalization) is to purify the water for the fish - so it would seem somewhat counter productive to add all sorts of chemical ferts unless absolutely necessary.


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## Aparker2005 (Jun 4, 2014)

So I think I've decided on a plan. 

My jungle Val isn't doing anything, just spreading. Any that do grow tall, immediately start melting. No idea what's going on. 

I think for this discus rescape, I'm gonna keep my 3 swords, and Java fern on the driftwood. Keep it simple. 

I can also start adding excel to hopefully help the swords and Java fern. Can't do that with the jungle Val. 

For lighting I'm gonna eventually get 2 36" finnex planted plus lights. Run them on the 24/7 cycle, but through a timer so the blue lights don't stay on so long overnight. Hopefully that will be enough light to help these 2 plants grow and not cause the crazy algae outbreaks. 

I'm just getting aggravated with all of these plants honestly. Everyone doing low tech tanks, theirs look so great and mine just has bba all over the leaves, leaves browning. Thankfully the swords and Java ferns are doing well. 

Does this all sound okay to go with? 

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## Smooch (May 14, 2016)

Aparker2005 said:


> So I think I've decided on a plan.
> 
> My jungle Val isn't doing anything, just spreading. Any that do grow tall, immediately start melting. No idea what's going on.
> 
> ...


I don't think it's necessary to have lights on 24/7. I think fish need a break and a rest period. That's just me though.

Considering the history of this tank, you can try it and see what happens. As for your jungle val, I don't know. It's not the water as they wouldn't spread if they didn't like something that was in it.


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## Aparker2005 (Jun 4, 2014)

Smooch said:


> I don't think it's necessary to have lights on 24/7. I think fish need a break and a rest period. That's just me though.
> 
> Considering the history of this tank, you can try it and see what happens. As for your jungle val, I don't know. It's not the water as they wouldn't spread if they didn't like something that was in it.


Right..... I plan on having the 24/7 cycle on a timer. Start at 6 am every day which is what the light resets to each time, and go through the 24/7 cycle until around 9 or 10 in which I'll have a timer shut it off then. 

The full cycle doesn't get completely dark and promotes algae. I thought having it to completely off and restart at 6 am would be better. 

I wish I knew why the vals won't grow tall anymore. 

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## Smooch (May 14, 2016)

Aparker2005 said:


> Right..... I plan on having the 24/7 cycle on a timer. Start at 6 am every day which is what the light resets to each time, and go through the 24/7 cycle until around 9 or 10 in which I'll have a timer shut it off then.
> 
> Sent from my SM-G935V using Tapatalk


That makes sense, but that is still a long photo period if they click on at 6 am. That would mean a 15 hour photo period if they shut off at 9 PM. I guess the only way to know is to try it, but I would definitely keep a close eye on things and shorten up the photo period if things start to get hairy... or fuzzy as the case may be.


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## Aparker2005 (Jun 4, 2014)

Right now I'm using the 72" beams work led and I don't like the yellow tint it gives off. Even if I can't use the 24/7 modes, I think the better coloration in the 24/7 will be better and I can just use a max setting on a shorter time. 

I have a 48" planted plus I use for the moonlights right now. Haven't used it for the regular lights yet since it doesn't cover the entire tank. 

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## Smooch (May 14, 2016)

Having more light with a shorter photo period would be my starting point. You always add more time to the photo period. It can be reduced as well, but if the 15 hour photo period causes problems, you're going to be frustrated with trying to figure out which way to go and what is causing the problem. 

Does that make sense? My brain is like Swiss cheese today.


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## Aparker2005 (Jun 4, 2014)

Yeah definitely does. I also wondered if some of my algae issues come from the overfeeding of the discus? I do 80% we twice per week. It's been bad, then fine, now turning bad again for algae. 

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## Smooch (May 14, 2016)

Yes, over feeding can certainly be a cause as it is putting more organics in the water column. The organics are from the food itself and fish waste.

Do you vacuum your tank? That would be a good indicator of how much stuff is in the tank. Filter cleaning can be somewhat telling, but stuff in the substrate tells a clearer story.


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## Aparker2005 (Jun 4, 2014)

I use pfs and always clean it. It's never too dirty like with gravel. 

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## Smooch (May 14, 2016)

If you're feeding young discus which need food often, maybe a better approach would be to do smaller water changes, but more often. I don't know if adults need to be fed as often. 

Instead of doing 2 massive water changes twice a week, try doing 3-4 smaller water changes and see how it goes for about a month.


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## Aparker2005 (Jun 4, 2014)

This is what I'd love to have 









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## Smooch (May 14, 2016)

There is no reason you can't. If your tank is out of balance, first you need to address that. If the plants still don't like your water for some reason, you'd need to find ones that grow and do well. Not all plants are going to like your water. It's a frustrating part of the hobby, but one part that everybody that keeps a planted tank needs to accept. 

I can't grow vals if my life depended on it. With recent events it could have very well been the stuff in my water that was killing them, but until I know for sure that my tanks are normal again, I'm going to keep throwing money after bad. Moss is another one. I put it in my tank with plenty of water flow and light and it dies. Again, it could have very well been a water issue. I don't know...


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## AbbeysDad (Apr 13, 2016)

Smooch said:


> That makes sense, but that is still a long photo period if they click on at 6 am. That would mean a 15 hour photo period if they shut off at 9 PM. I guess the only way to know is to try it, but I would definitely keep a close eye on things and shorten up the photo period if things start to get hairy... or fuzzy as the case may be.


No, this is not quite right. In 24/7 mode, the light comes on at 6am, but it's a very low intensity white, with red - a true sunrise effect. The light slowly ramps up intensity and isn't even close to bright until 11am or noon, with the brightest light at 3pm....at which point the light ramps down in intensity reaching sunset around 6pm, then on to moonlight.
So it seems like a long photoperiod, but the lower intensity makes the difference.
Now having written the above, the light could be used on MAX like a 'regular light' or any custom combination in which case, the duration would need to be much less.

I'm running my low tech 60g in 24/7 mode, on a timer on at 6am off at midnight and it's working great!!!


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## Smooch (May 14, 2016)

AbbeysDad said:


> No, this is not quite right. In 24/7 mode, the light comes on at 6am, but it's a very low intensity white, with red - a true sunrise effect. The light slowly ramps up intensity and isn't even close to bright until 11am or noon, with the brightest light at 3pm....at which point the light ramps down in intensity reaching sunset around 6pm, then on to moonlight.
> So it seems like a long photoperiod, but the lower intensity makes the difference.
> Now having written the above, the light could be used on MAX like a 'regular light' or any custom combination in which case, the duration would need to be much less.
> 
> I'm running my low tech 60g in 24/7 mode, on a timer on at 6am off at midnight and it's working great!!!


What works in your tank does not mean it works for all of them.

There is a long thread about the tank that is being discussed in this thread. OP was having a series of issues that needed to be dealt with which took awhile to resolve. If you want to hunt down that thread and read the many pages of it, feel free to do so. In the meantime, because I know of what happened with this tank and the frustration OP went through, I think it would be wise that he go slow and add to the photo period as needed.


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## AbbeysDad (Apr 13, 2016)

Smooch said:


> What works in your tank does not mean it works for all of them.
> 
> There is a long thread about the tank that is being discussed in this thread. OP was having a series of issues that needed to be dealt with which took awhile to resolve. If you want to hunt down that thread and read the many pages of it, feel free to do so. In the meantime, because I know of what happened with this tank and the frustration OP went through, I think it would be wise that he go slow and add to the photo period as needed.


I was merely pointing out that the 24/7 feature is not like a 15 hour photoperiod with a regular light since much of that period is with significantly reduced intensity.


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