plants and lighting??

[drunkenmonkey]

i have a 32 gal tank with two flourescent lights. one is a hagen power glo (20watts) and has a light spectrum of 18000K, and the other is a hagen flora glo (also 20watts) with a light spectrum of 2800K. What kind of lighting is this, and what kind of plants do you recomend? I plan on keeping some tiger barbs, zebra danios, and something else i have not decided. also, do you think that I will need a CO2 injector?? thanks !!

Drunkenmonkey

 

[elgecko]

You have 40 watts of light on a 32 gallon tank.

I would recommend a minimum of 2 watts per gallon. You could most likely get a way with 1 more 20 watt bulb to get you to 60 watts per gallon, which would work for a lot of nice plants.
Some that would work would be Aponogeton ulvaceus, Hornwort, Java moss, Java Fern, Cryptocoryne crispatula, Cryptocoryne wendtii, Rotala rotundifolia, and Sagittaria subulata. These are plants that I've had success with at 2 watts per gallon.

I would not worry about CO2.

 

[drunkenmonkey]

thanks elgecko! my hood has reflectors, but I doubt it'll raise the light output by THAT much. I'll just leave my lighting the way it is now, and follow your plant recomendations

Drunkenmonkey

 

[elgecko]

I'm not sure you understood what I was saying in my post. If you leave the lighting the way you have it now, I'm not sure you will get much to grow. You have 1.25 watts of light now. It is very low light. If you are able to add another strip light with a 20 watt bulb, then you will have enough light for plants.

 

[Bol]

Or, put another way, I think elgecko's list is plants that would do well under 2 wpg.

However, if you leave off the Rotala and the Saggitaria, the rest should do fairly well at 1.25 wpg. They have in my experience, anyway.

Also, water sprite and wisteria should probably do fairly well under that light. Maybe anacharis, but that's iffy.

 

[drunkenmonkey]

I'm not sure you understood what I was saying in my post. If you leave the lighting the way you have it now, I'm not sure you will get much to grow. You have 1.25 watts of light now. It is very low light. If you are able to add another strip light with a 20 watt bulb, then you will have enough light for plants.

Oh hmm... well I bought a hood that has two slots for lights, so I doubt that I can add another light any recomendations??

Drunkenmonkey

 

[Bol]

Personally, I think you'd be fine at 1.25 wpg if you stick exclusively to low-light plants. I've had very good results running a tank at 1.33 wpg.

 

[Colin_BC]

This may be of some help from you as I just came down the same road...

I have a 30G planted aquarium. I started with one 24" Power Glo fluorescent. The two plants I had did ok, but all this is saying is that they didn't die. One month later I bought lots of planst with varying light requirements as well as purchased a new canopy ($100 CAD) that would hold 2x 24" fluoro's, so I used a power glo & and an aqua glo. My plants looked better, but not great. Another month later I discovered I could have both canopies on together for a final total of three 24" fluoro's (2x power glo, 1x aqua glo). All my plants looked decent after this. A couple weeks after this I added CO2 via a store-bought hang-on-the-back unit (yeast) with a bubble diffuser. Within a week all the plants looked great. Growth rate has increased noticably and the plants look much healthier. I have plants with high and low light demands and they all look better than ever, but still with plenty of room too improve.

The moral of the story, upgrade your lighting first. Once you've hit at least 2W per gallon you can start thinking of adding CO2. Right now, light is your limiting factor in good plant health and growth. See if you can fit both your light hoods on together as I did (with 1/16 of an inch to spare Or if you are not afraid of using a couple tools, you could consider what I'm now doing.


I am now in the process of building a new canopy designed for up to eight 8 compact fluorescents for my 30G. I'm going to use 6-8 23W spiral compact fluorescents for 4W-6W per gallon. It's a simple and cheap DYI model. It's a wood box with an open bottom and a hinged top, built to the right dimensions to sit on the inner lip of the aquarium and still leave a couple inches of room for the heater and filter on the back. I am building it to the same dimensions of the glass canopy that my current lights sit on. Inside will be two cheap bathroom strip lights, each intended for 4x 60W standard light bulbs. I'm a bit worried about the heat generated from the compact fluoro's in the enclosed wooden box, so to counter this I'm drilling plenty of holes for airflow and will monitor with a thermometer. If the heat buildup is still a worry I will cut out a hole in the back small enough to attach a cheap computer case fan. The wood (oak laminate) is huge with enough left over to build at least 3 more. They're cutting it for me at the hardware place if I give them measurements. I just have to screw it togther and attach the lights. I live in an apartment where my only power tool is 12V drill. Anything I build is as KISS as can be.

Hope this helps!

Colin

 

[Colin_BC]

I forgot to mention that you can often take your old canopies that aren't in use back to the LFS and trade them in if they're in good shape, or sell them in the local buy & sells or other auction type places.

 

[drunkenmonkey]

so do you think that cryptocoryne and anubias plants would be able to survive ?? i think that hornwort and java fern and moss would be able to survive?

Drunkenmonkey

 

[Colin_BC]

The cryptocoryne should be fine. I kept one alive with very similar wattage per gallon as you (before adding CO2). I don't have experience wit the anubias to speak of that. I can, however, recommend this site for info on lots of plants. It's off a pinned thread in this forum, and it's my favourite plant site as you can browse by picture.

Colin

 

[Max]

why dont you just buy a 30 watt light and replace the 20 watt with it making that 60 watts?

also this isnt really a plant, but it is, alge balls, and they actuly prevent alge by taking all of its food

i recomed aquabotanicle, i got free shipping

 

[Bol]

so do you think that cryptocoryne and anubias plants would be able to survive

Yes, they should be just fine, although slow in growing. Anubias can almost grow in the dark, from my experience. And, in fact, I'd almost say that anubias do better in low-light tanks, because from what I've seen (and read) at higher light levels the tough, long-lived anubias leaves are prime spots for green spot algae to form.

Also, the algae balls (aka marimo balls, or moss balls) that dragonfish mentioned should do fine in that tank, too.

 

[Max]

Also, the algae balls (aka marimo balls, or moss balls) that dragonfish mentioned should do fine in that tank, too.

he he!!! i got it right whacko (im new to have plants, i still need to get a new light...)!!! lol im hyper to night

 

[Lateral Line]

I think one of the problems with your setup is the spectrum. You would be far better off with 2 full spectrum lamps, (5500K - 6500K), rather then the extremes you have at the moment. The cold lamp is radiating a lot below the photosynthetic range, the hot lamp above it. Net result, only a little usable light from either lamp.

At light levels that low, I doubt CO2 would have any significant effect.